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Upgrade

388: The Year of the Headset

 

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00:00:08   From Relay FM, this is Upgrade, episode 388.

00:00:13   My name is Myke Hurley, I'm joined by Jason Snell.

00:00:15   This episode is brought to you by Bombas, Fitbot, and DoorDash.

00:00:18   Happy New Year, Jason.

00:00:20   - Happy New Year, Myke. We're back.

00:00:21   We're here. It's 2022.

00:00:24   I don't know how this happened. Who allowed this to happen?

00:00:26   - Sorry, it was my fault.

00:00:27   - Oh. Are you Father Time?

00:00:29   - Uh-huh, I have a #snowtalk question for you from Sims,

00:00:32   and Sims wants to know, Jason,

00:00:33   what did you do to ring in the new year?

00:00:36   - Oh boy, nothing that interesting.

00:00:38   Watched some movies as is traditional,

00:00:42   watched some TV shows as is not traditional.

00:00:44   We cut the cord, and what I found is that

00:00:49   some combination of having fewer channels to watch

00:00:52   and also the complete lack of

00:00:55   New Year's Eve coverage on TV

00:00:59   that is fun to like count down the new year.

00:01:01   It was all bad.

00:01:02   It was all really bad stuff.

00:01:03   I wanted to just put on a thing that was like light,

00:01:07   you know, jollity and japes for the new year

00:01:10   as we counted down.

00:01:11   I really wanted something from like a ballroom

00:01:13   in London or something.

00:01:15   And instead it was just like people gyrating in Miami

00:01:19   and people gyrating in Times Square

00:01:21   who were freezing to death and it was not that interesting.

00:01:24   So, yeah, so the televised entertainment part

00:01:28   wasn't that good at the end.

00:01:30   So we just kind of shut it all down,

00:01:32   waited for the new year to arrive and said,

00:01:34   "Happy new year."

00:01:35   And then we went to bed.

00:01:36   (laughs)

00:01:36   And that was actually, you know what I did?

00:01:39   Let me rephrase this now

00:01:40   to what Sims is really not expecting,

00:01:43   which is, you know what I did to ring in the new year?

00:01:45   I checked to see that all the scripts that I had written

00:01:48   for my weather station

00:01:49   (laughing)

00:01:50   that I tried to intuit would break on January 1st

00:01:55   unless I was careful, actually worked after midnight.

00:02:00   I ran them all to see.

00:02:02   And the answer is no, they were broken.

00:02:04   So I fixed those scripts

00:02:06   'cause I didn't do something right in them.

00:02:08   I was very clever.

00:02:09   I was aware it was gonna be a problem,

00:02:11   but I fixed it the wrong way.

00:02:13   And then I fixed them and then they worked.

00:02:15   And then I went to bed.

00:02:17   That was, in the end,

00:02:18   that was how I rang in the new year is

00:02:20   I fixed my own particular Y2K22 issue.

00:02:25   - Amazing.

00:02:26   - And then I went to sleep.

00:02:29   - Very nice.

00:02:30   We watched "Queer Eye."

00:02:32   - All right, that's nice.

00:02:33   - The news season, oh my God, it's so good.

00:02:35   - We did "When Harry Met Sally,"

00:02:36   which is kind of a New Year's Eve tradition for us.

00:02:39   We did not get to the Marx Brothers this year.

00:02:41   Lauren was like, "I feel like we just watched 'Duck Soup.'"

00:02:43   And I said, "Well, we didn't.

00:02:44   "We watched it exactly a year ago."

00:02:46   She's like, "Well, I don't wanna watch it again."

00:02:49   And which led me down a rabbit hole

00:02:50   where I found that a night of the opera,

00:02:53   which is maybe the best Marx Brothers movie,

00:02:57   is, other than "Duck Soup" perhaps,

00:03:00   has just got a restoration and came out on Blu-ray.

00:03:04   So I ordered that on Amazon.

00:03:06   That's one of the things I did to ring in the new year,

00:03:08   is order a Marx Brothers movie from whatever, 90 years ago.

00:03:13   But yeah, that was, it's, you know, stay up,

00:03:16   watch some stuff, have a nice time.

00:03:19   I had a big bottle of Lambic beer that we opened.

00:03:24   You know, it's married people New Year's

00:03:27   in the time of Omicron, I suppose.

00:03:30   - Thank you to Sims for that question.

00:03:31   If you would like to send in something to help us

00:03:33   open an episode of the show,

00:03:36   just send out a tweet with the hashtag Snow Talk

00:03:37   or use question mark Snow Talk

00:03:38   in the Relay FM members Discord.

00:03:41   I have a few items of follow up for you, Jason Snow.

00:03:44   - Okay.

00:03:45   - I wanted to just say that I watched No Time to Die

00:03:48   over the break, the James Bond movie.

00:03:49   - Ah, you found time.

00:03:51   - I found time to--

00:03:52   - To watch.

00:03:53   - No time.

00:03:54   - No time to die.

00:03:56   - It was incredible.

00:03:57   I would have included it on my Upgrades nominations.

00:04:00   - Ah, so the Upgradients were right, is what you're saying.

00:04:03   - It was so good, so good.

00:04:04   It's just a great movie and it's an especially great movie

00:04:08   for a James Bond fan.

00:04:09   It was really, really great.

00:04:10   - Right.

00:04:11   - And Daniel Craig is the best.

00:04:12   - I haven't seen the last two James Bond movies,

00:04:14   which is funny 'cause I've seen all of them.

00:04:15   - I hadn't either.

00:04:16   I hadn't seen Spectre.

00:04:17   So we watched Spectre and then No Time Today.

00:04:21   Very good.

00:04:23   Recommend. - I'll get to it.

00:04:24   - Big recommend. - All right.

00:04:25   - Mella, the M-E-L-A, Mella. - Yes.

00:04:31   - The recipe app, the library sharing that we spoke about.

00:04:36   - Oh, that's now public?

00:04:37   - It's out now, yep. - Oh, good.

00:04:39   - So yeah, I immediately enabled that

00:04:41   and now I'm able to use it with all of the shared recipes

00:04:45   that Indina and I have.

00:04:46   'cause she had kind of gone in and added a bunch of stuff

00:04:50   and I didn't wanna have to go and do the same, right?

00:04:53   'Cause she was using paprika

00:04:55   and moved from paprika to mela.

00:04:57   And yeah, I love it.

00:04:58   I've been putting some cocktail recipes in there.

00:05:01   - Yeah, I wanna get a bunch of them.

00:05:04   We've got, in one of our shelves,

00:05:07   we've got a big stack of recipes

00:05:10   that are like cards from meal services

00:05:13   and printouts of things and all of that.

00:05:15   and I really would like to get them in there

00:05:17   because I like cooking with the iPad

00:05:19   actually on the counter, it's nice.

00:05:21   - One thing I'll say about like the meal kit rest,

00:05:23   like you know, like the Hello Freshers,

00:05:25   the Blue Aprons of the World,

00:05:26   most of their recipes they also publish online.

00:05:29   - Are on their website, yeah.

00:05:31   Actually what I was thinking is,

00:05:32   what I'm gonna do is I'm gonna,

00:05:33   'cause I did this with one that I was about to prepare.

00:05:36   What you do is you get the card that you saved out

00:05:40   and you search for that recipe,

00:05:43   find it on the meal prep site

00:05:45   and then Mella grabs it from the web page.

00:05:48   That's the trick, and then you throw away the card.

00:05:50   -Super good. Very nice.

00:05:52   Very good app.

00:05:54   If you are looking for the list of every nomination

00:05:58   we mentioned on the show,

00:05:59   because we had quite a few people contact us,

00:06:01   and say, "What was the name of this thing?

00:06:02   What was the name of that thing?"

00:06:03   -Yeah, the ones we didn't end up settling on as runners-up.

00:06:07   -Jason published basically a copy and paste of our document,

00:06:11   which also has all the percentages

00:06:12   in for the upgradience votes,

00:06:13   case you ever wanted to look at them. For next year I'm gonna try and find some

00:06:21   kind of way of making this non-spoilery and available. I wonder if we can get our

00:06:27   our dear official upgrade... what is his official title as the keeper of

00:06:36   the upgradees? Yeah, Zach. Keeper of the upgradees. If we could ask Zach to

00:06:43   to add like an also mentioned or something just on upgradees.com going forward. We're

00:06:47   not going to go back through the whole history of the upgradees but maybe we could add something

00:06:51   like that coming going forward where there's like these are the other ones that Myke and

00:06:54   Jason mentioned that didn't end up. It's like it's an honor just to be mentioned.

00:06:58   Yeah there'll be one thing or something I don't know what the right thing to do is yet.

00:07:03   I mean the read because usually we'd put all that sort of stuff in the show notes right

00:07:07   but I don't want to put all the stuff in the show notes because then it spoils it if you

00:07:10   look at the show notes. So all the nominees, like the runners up and the winners are all

00:07:16   on Upgradies.com but not all of the nominees. So we need to think of a way to do it because

00:07:21   as well it's like really it's only apps and podcasts that needs to be, right?

00:07:26   That's true.

00:07:27   You don't need to, like, because the thing is what I was thinking, a lot of this stuff

00:07:32   is Google-able but not all of it, right? And like, but like you don't need, if we say all

00:07:37   the new James Bond movie. Like, what could it be? Right? Like, you can work that out

00:07:41   on your own.

00:07:42   - Yeah, it's, I mean, it would be something too if, like, there was a story that one of

00:07:45   us thought was the story of the year and then we ended up not going with it and that the

00:07:49   link might be valuable. But yeah, it's mostly, here's a product with a name and what we heard

00:07:53   from people, especially as people who are not native English speakers, especially, will

00:07:56   say the name of something and they'll be like, "I have no idea what they just said." So,

00:08:00   I get it.

00:08:01   - So, we're gonna, we're gonna, I think about it. Whether it goes on the website or whether

00:08:05   we find somewhere else to put it.

00:08:07   - You can check in the meantime,

00:08:09   I've been using my microblog,

00:08:10   which I had not ever used before to post this along with

00:08:14   a connected thing that I posted.

00:08:17   - You posted the original pickies rules.

00:08:20   - This, that's right.

00:08:21   Should we tell people that the pickies

00:08:25   have to run website now?

00:08:27   - Well, it's definitely gonna come up on connected.

00:08:30   - Okay.

00:08:31   - 'Cause we haven't gotten to speak about

00:08:32   the triple J takeover on connected,

00:08:34   which if you have no idea what I'm talking about,

00:08:37   I'll put a link in the show notes to this,

00:08:38   but like, I don't really think it's gonna help you,

00:08:41   but there's a good episode of "Connected"

00:08:44   that came out a couple of weeks ago.

00:08:46   - That I hijacked with John Voorhees and James Thompson,

00:08:49   because we had been sort of become a running gag

00:08:53   of threatening to take over "Connected"

00:08:55   and that like there was a succession plan

00:08:57   and all of these things,

00:08:58   which led to one of my favorite things I've ever seen

00:09:00   in the Discord, by the way, which is,

00:09:02   I think it was Kate in their notebook wrote down succession plan,

00:09:07   don't make one,

00:09:08   which I think was John Voorhees advice was the trick is not to make a succession

00:09:16   plan because then nobody will be in line to succeed you.

00:09:19   And then you will survive. This culminated in the Christmas week episode,

00:09:23   which had no ads and was originally just going to be a skip week.

00:09:25   And several months ago we had the conversation among all six of us,

00:09:28   which was like, should we, and it ended up, I mean,

00:09:32   the answer was we probably shouldn't and so we did it anyway and it's there but really

00:09:36   it's gonna make the most sense for people who actually listen to Connected because it

00:09:40   is sort of a loving satire/real episode of Connected from a parallel universe.

00:09:47   So yeah we're doing the annual Rickies this week but we haven't had the ability to talk

00:09:56   about the pic because we pre-recorded our year in review episode before that

00:10:01   you even recorded so I kind of love that because it meant that for a week that

00:10:05   the connected audience is like they're not even they're pretending it did I

00:10:08   hallucinate it did that really exist yeah the draft pennant that you lovingly

00:10:16   made that we spoke about recently your gift to me has found its home I've

00:10:21   I've posted it up here at the studio.

00:10:24   I've put it in a place, I'd originally put it,

00:10:26   so the kind of the way I have my studio set up,

00:10:29   I have this kind of like sound insulated,

00:10:32   like blankets and barriers that go around my recording desk.

00:10:37   And I had put it on the inside here.

00:10:40   So it was behind me when I'm recording.

00:10:43   But then I thought to myself today,

00:10:47   wouldn't it be fun to put it on the other side,

00:10:49   which is then in view when I stream on Twitch.

00:10:53   So now what you put people from this week's Twitch stream

00:10:57   will see it.

00:10:58   I put a link in the show notes to an image

00:11:00   of what it looks like.

00:11:02   And I think we've got one for you too, right?

00:11:04   - Yeah.

00:11:05   - What I also like you can see off in the corner

00:11:06   is my connected MagTricky as well.

00:11:09   - I saw that, I noticed that.

00:11:10   - Start to a little metal cabinet.

00:11:12   So yeah, that's now people will know at all times

00:11:16   whether I am the challenger or the winner.

00:11:19   - So the champion, yeah.

00:11:21   I'm so happy about it.

00:11:23   I'm satisfied now.

00:11:24   It's not quite the same as the Ricky's trophies,

00:11:29   and that's okay, but it is a, the tricky, yes,

00:11:34   the short, tricky for short.

00:11:35   - Thank you.

00:11:36   - But it is exactly what I want, I think,

00:11:40   is just a little flag there

00:11:42   to signify the current draft champion status.

00:11:44   Excellent.

00:11:45   - What I like is how big it is.

00:11:47   - Yeah.

00:11:48   - This is how I feel that you, you know,

00:11:49   you're a certain dominance here.

00:11:51   It's so much larger than any trophy that I have.

00:11:55   - But it's, but it's two dimensional, it's flat.

00:11:57   So in terms of volume, I don't know, but it's,

00:11:59   it's literally, I got it to be just the size

00:12:02   of the other penance that I have that are my like,

00:12:04   that were on my childhood wall that are still,

00:12:06   that are on my wall here in my office.

00:12:07   It's penance sized, exactly.

00:12:09   Actually by default it was going to be bigger.

00:12:10   And I asked the person who made it,

00:12:11   can we make it this size?

00:12:13   And she said, yeah, I can cut it down to that size.

00:12:14   That's fine.

00:12:15   I also want to do a bit of follow out to our friend David Spark's upgradey winner from

00:12:22   MacPowerUsers.

00:12:24   David today announced that he is going fully independent and giving up his law practice.

00:12:31   Many years ago David left his law firm and kind of went semi-independent, right?

00:12:38   Create his own law practice, continued practicing law and running MacSparky and he has now given

00:12:43   up the law practice and is going full on Max Barkey and has created something called Max

00:12:49   Barkey Labs, which is a really cool membership program. So yeah, I just wanted to put a link

00:12:54   in the show notes to David's announcement of this and also to the most recent episode

00:12:59   of MacPowie where he talks about it. Because I love David. David's one of the nicest people

00:13:03   on the planet and I really want him to succeed with this. So I just wanted to mention it

00:13:08   here too. I have signed up to become a member of Max Barkey Labs and I encourage you to

00:13:14   also.

00:13:15   I, when he told me about this, I was very excited. I feel like he's been, he was talking

00:13:22   about how, oh, I gotta do this and I gotta do this and I'm thinking about this because

00:13:26   I saw one when I was down at Thanksgiving. I saw him and I know you saw him shortly thereafter.

00:13:31   And it was funny because he's so agonizing over it, right? Because he wants to take care

00:13:37   of his clients. And also it is this huge step like many of us have taken to be, you know,

00:13:42   he already took the step to be independent, but he brought, you know, he kept a law practice

00:13:46   going. He was independent, but he was Max Sparky plus, you know, Max Sparky Esquire.

00:13:50   It was kind of weird because like he was independent, but still doing the thing he was doing before.

00:13:55   Yeah, still doing two jobs. Yeah, exactly right. So it was, you know, like I understood

00:14:01   completely why he was agonizing over all of it. And yet from my perspective, and I think

00:14:07   the perspective of everybody who knows him,

00:14:09   it's absolutely the logical next step in his career.

00:14:14   'Cause the truth is that, you know,

00:14:16   it's the same story we've all told,

00:14:18   is how can you focus on building this thing

00:14:20   that you wanna do if you've got this complete other thing?

00:14:23   Like, if you think about how great a job David does

00:14:26   with his Max Sparky stuff, like, it's not his 100% focus.

00:14:30   It's not been up till now.

00:14:32   It's been a partial focus with this whole other job.

00:14:36   And now it's his focus 100%. It's going to be great.

00:14:39   And he's going to succeed wildly at it.

00:14:41   And I know that, you know, it's easy for me to say

00:14:43   because I'm not the one making the risks

00:14:45   by shutting down part of my livelihood.

00:14:48   But, you know, I am extremely confident

00:14:51   that he's going to do great. And Max Parkey Labs, you know,

00:14:55   we had -- all of us who have done memberships

00:14:57   had conversations with David.

00:14:59   So I hope that he has really kind of taken to heart

00:15:01   a lot of feedback from a lot of people

00:15:03   in different kinds of membership systems

00:15:06   and really tune that thing.

00:15:07   And I'm looking forward to see what comes out

00:15:09   of Max Sparky Labs.

00:15:11   - Yeah, like I've seen various iterations

00:15:13   that he showed me of like what he was gonna be offering.

00:15:15   And as it's come down to where it is now,

00:15:17   I can feel everybody's hands on his shoulders, you know?

00:15:21   - Yeah, there was very much like,

00:15:22   "Let me promise the moon."

00:15:24   And we're all like, "No, no, no, no, no.

00:15:26   Just scope it out."

00:15:28   - Yeah, stuff we can do later on.

00:15:30   - And it's good.

00:15:31   The end result is something that I think--

00:15:33   - And like I think everybody else,

00:15:35   I am so incredibly jealous of the name.

00:15:39   MaxSparkyLabs is just a great name for a membership program.

00:15:45   It's just such a good name,

00:15:47   and I'm really jealous that he has such a good brand on it.

00:15:50   It's really, really nice.

00:15:52   And yeah, and I'm super excited about it,

00:15:55   and so I just wanted to mention it here,

00:15:56   and there's a bunch of stuff that you can go and read

00:15:59   and check out what David's up to.

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00:18:12   So let's talk about Apple in 2022.

00:18:15   So you wrote a couple of articles for Macworld kind of detailing some things that we could

00:18:19   expect and things that you're looking for.

00:18:22   And I kind of wanted to go through them and pepper in some, there's been some reports

00:18:25   from Mark Gorman as well over the weekend about maybe some timelines for some of this

00:18:31   stuff which is exciting as we look towards the new year.

00:18:35   So let's first talk about the Mac because there's still a bunch of stuff to come.

00:18:38   So I guess the expectation is we will be completing the Apple Silicon transition in 2022 fully,

00:18:45   right?

00:18:46   Yeah, that's my expectation.

00:18:49   I'm not sure about the timeline.

00:18:51   Mark Gurman seems to feel like they're going to wrap it up soon, which I'm sure was always

00:18:55   their intent was to wrap.

00:18:56   When they say it's going to be a two-year transition, I know we've talked about this,

00:19:00   but like when Apple says that, they want to beat it.

00:19:03   Like they're trying to be coy.

00:19:04   They want to beat it.

00:19:05   But we have all of the supply chain problems and all the product delays.

00:19:08   And so I'm not entirely sure.

00:19:10   I feel like everything's going to be announced and that there'll be an Apple silicon version

00:19:15   of everything.

00:19:16   There is a rumor, by the way, floating around there that there's going to be one last revision

00:19:19   to the Intel Mac Pro.

00:19:20   And I think that may be true because they may want to have like one Intel system that

00:19:26   they can still have that's like for all their especially Mac Pro customers, institutional

00:19:30   customers that'll like last a while.

00:19:31   It's like if you really need to stay on Intel for a long time, you can buy this and it will

00:19:35   will stay for a long time, but I don't wanna quibble about that because I think there will

00:19:41   also be an Apple Silicon Mac Pro, right? I think we will be able to say that, yes, there's

00:19:45   the last Intel Mac might be a revision to the Mac Pro, but I think they're gonna do

00:19:49   an Apple Silicon Mac Pro and that's gonna complete the transition. The question is sort

00:19:54   of when and how, but I feel like they're gonna do it. I think they're gonna get under the

00:19:59   wire. Whether it's mid-year or it's really like in December, I think they're going to

00:20:05   do it. I think we're going to be in a case where all of the primary representatives of

00:20:10   every Apple model will be at Apple Silicon, even if there are a couple Intel legacy models

00:20:16   just kicking around in the background for a little while longer.

00:20:19   So, Mark's report in the Power On newsletter was saying that his expectation is that they

00:20:25   will finish the transition as early as June, so WWDC.

00:20:30   And that will be Mac Pro and iMac Pro.

00:20:32   I don't think he mentioned anything about a Mac Mini,

00:20:34   but I guess maybe that's just not of the most importance.

00:20:37   - As early as is doing a lot of heavy lifting there, right?

00:20:41   Because as early as June, or it could be December, right?

00:20:43   It literally could be any time after that.

00:20:45   I think--

00:20:46   - Oh yeah, I always get that one messed up in my brain

00:20:48   when I see, for some reason when he says as early as,

00:20:51   I think it means no later than,

00:20:53   but that's the exact opposite.

00:20:54   - Yeah, it's like saying you could save as much as 5%,

00:20:59   you could save as much as 90%, right?

00:21:04   It's like, well, you could, but it'll probably be 2%,

00:21:06   it won't be 90%.

00:21:07   - We have sold over 173 units.

00:21:10   - Yeah, well, you mean 174 you're saying.

00:21:12   So yeah, I like that.

00:21:14   We've been in business for more than 27 years.

00:21:17   Like, okay, so 28 then, got it, got it.

00:21:20   Good timing there.

00:21:21   So I, here's my prediction,

00:21:25   since we're in the prediction business here,

00:21:26   we don't compete on predictions like you do on connected.

00:21:30   - Well, we do, but it's just a one week window

00:21:33   on these things.

00:21:34   - Yeah, I suppose so.

00:21:35   So I think that they will announce something at WWDC,

00:21:40   assuming that they're confident that they can ship it

00:21:46   by the end of the year, maybe even before that.

00:21:48   But WWDC is the right time to announce

00:21:51   the Apple Silicon Mac Pro, and it doesn't have to shift.

00:21:53   - I feel very confident that that's what they're gonna do,

00:21:55   'cause they've done that two times before

00:21:57   with this product.

00:21:58   Like, okay, so they did it with the Mac Pro.

00:22:00   - With the Mac Pro and the iMac Pro.

00:22:02   - But as we said before, that iMac Pro was the Mac Pro.

00:22:05   - It was.

00:22:05   Nobody is gonna be like,

00:22:10   "Well, I was gonna buy an Intel Mac Pro,

00:22:13   "but now that they've announced

00:22:15   "this Apple Silicon Mac Pro,

00:22:16   "it's just not gonna happen."

00:22:18   Because like every time they've done that,

00:22:20   they keep the old product around.

00:22:21   Like the trash can Mac Pro, you could still buy,

00:22:24   I think after they started shipping the other,

00:22:27   and it will be the same.

00:22:28   - I am a believer in this rumor

00:22:30   about the updated Xeon Intel Mac Pro.

00:22:32   I think that they're gonna keep that thing around

00:22:33   in the background for a while,

00:22:35   because they know that they've got customers

00:22:39   are gonna be like, "Oh, but I need this card,

00:22:41   or I need this driver,

00:22:42   and I need this thing that's only on Intel."

00:22:44   And they're gonna be like, "All right,

00:22:45   - Especially because they're expecting it

00:22:48   to be a different body shape, right?

00:22:50   Like the rumors are saying it's gonna be a different case.

00:22:54   Right?

00:22:55   So I think it would make sense

00:22:56   that they will then keep the older one around,

00:22:59   I would expect for a pretty long time.

00:23:02   Kind of like the way you would see it in the laptops, right?

00:23:05   Where like you can still get the Touch Bar MacBook Pro

00:23:07   if you try hard enough.

00:23:09   - Right, and they're kicking around

00:23:11   and they have inventory and they have refurbs

00:23:13   and like Intel, 'cause there aren't people,

00:23:15   believe it or not, who are going to need Intel.

00:23:19   They're just going to.

00:23:20   Like, so there will be ways for them to get it,

00:23:24   but Apple's gonna move on.

00:23:25   And in terms of what that Mac Pro is,

00:23:27   you know, I think it's gonna be just that compact rumor

00:23:31   makes sense to me, especially if GPUs outside

00:23:35   of the processor are not an option.

00:23:36   There'll be storage and maybe some other places

00:23:41   where you could add connectivity.

00:23:42   So internal storage and connectivity options to bulk it up

00:23:46   and that's why it's a big desktop tower kind of thing.

00:23:51   I think that's reasonable,

00:23:52   but I think Apple's not gonna do

00:23:54   external GPU support this time.

00:23:56   I think it's gonna be exactly what we think it's gonna be,

00:23:58   exactly what the rumors say it's gonna be,

00:24:00   which is they're gonna offer those M1 Macs processors

00:24:05   in 2X and 4X configurations.

00:24:10   And that's what, and so the GPUs will scale

00:24:14   and the cores will scale, but it's just gonna be,

00:24:17   I think we know exactly what this is gonna be.

00:24:19   I think you could predict it.

00:24:20   I'm actually most curious about

00:24:23   if they build in a bunch of storage

00:24:25   and expansion stuff inside what that looks like.

00:24:30   But I think that's what the expandability is gonna be,

00:24:33   is storage and expansion.

00:24:35   And maybe, you know, maybe they'll do something else wild,

00:24:37   like put the processors on a daughter card

00:24:40   or something like that so that you could actually swap out

00:24:42   the processors later.

00:24:43   Like I wouldn't put it past Apple for them to say,

00:24:48   since we control this platform,

00:24:50   we can build it the way we want.

00:24:53   And that includes some kinds of swapability

00:24:55   that pros desire that maybe weren't there before,

00:25:00   but it's not gonna be like it was.

00:25:03   It's gonna be a totally different kind of take on it.

00:25:05   - Considering when this product is gonna debut,

00:25:08   Do you think it will be an M1?

00:25:10   Like Max? - I do.

00:25:12   - Yeah? - I do.

00:25:13   I think that although there will be an M2 this year,

00:25:18   and Mark Gurman has that report,

00:25:20   and it's exactly what we thought,

00:25:21   which is basically it will progress

00:25:23   just like the A14 to A15.

00:25:26   M1 to M2, it'll be a little bit faster, right?

00:25:28   That's just, it's the same sort of thing.

00:25:30   I think Apple's probably using the M1 as the basis, right?

00:25:34   They do the M1 and then they do the M1 Pro and Max,

00:25:36   and then the Mac Pro will have multiple M1 Pro

00:25:39   or Macs chips in it, and probably Macs,

00:25:43   and it'll all be based on the M1,

00:25:45   because there seems to be like a real sort of amount

00:25:48   of time that they need to build up to that point.

00:25:50   And honestly, I'm not sure M2 Macs--

00:25:53   - Would be enough of a thing to try and--

00:25:56   - Right. - Yeah, okay.

00:25:57   - And also, they're probably,

00:25:58   they have some thoughts about how they want

00:26:00   to take their chip architecture

00:26:02   for the Pro line going forward in terms of dual and quad,

00:26:06   And probably M1 has some of that in it,

00:26:08   but they probably got some other things that they wanna do,

00:26:11   maybe including having scalable graphics

00:26:13   or something like that,

00:26:14   that will be in a future version that they're working on.

00:26:17   But I think M1 will deliver what they want now.

00:26:21   And I don't think anybody's gonna look at that M1 Mac Pro

00:26:23   and be like, "Ah, it's a lightweight

00:26:24   'cause it says M1 on it."

00:26:25   'Cause it's gonna be M1 Mac's quad

00:26:28   and people are gonna lose their minds.

00:26:30   So I think that's what it's gonna be.

00:26:32   - From a design perspective,

00:26:34   Obviously we've got some new design stuff, right?

00:26:37   We've got the iMac and the MacBook Pros, they are new.

00:26:40   They have stuff that's interesting

00:26:42   and different about them.

00:26:43   Are you expecting any more surprises in 2022

00:26:48   from like a hardware design perspective on the Mac?

00:26:50   - I think, I mean, a surprise is the question.

00:26:55   Germin has reported several times,

00:26:57   so I'm gonna take him at his word,

00:26:59   that the new MacBook Air is going to be a serious redesign.

00:27:02   They are going to redesign the MacBook Air

00:27:04   for essentially the first time since the MacBook Air

00:27:07   as we know it was introduced back when.

00:27:10   'Cause remember they brought it back essentially

00:27:14   after they kind of left it hanging

00:27:16   and the modern new version of the MacBook Air

00:27:19   is a dead ringer for the old MacBook Air.

00:27:22   I think that they now are going to do their new take

00:27:25   on MacBook Air and so it is gonna look different

00:27:27   and what is that gonna look like?

00:27:28   And I do think it's gonna have colors.

00:27:30   So I think that's great.

00:27:31   I think the MacBook Air is gonna be,

00:27:34   The M1 MacBook Air is really nice,

00:27:35   but it is indistinguishable.

00:27:36   Take it from me,

00:27:38   somebody who lives in a family of MacBook Air users.

00:27:41   We have so many MacBook Airs in this house.

00:27:43   My daughter was home over the break,

00:27:44   and it's like, everybody's got their own MacBook Air.

00:27:47   There are four of them,

00:27:48   and all of them are from different model years,

00:27:51   but they're all MacBook Airs,

00:27:54   and they all look exactly the same,

00:27:56   and the 2022 Air won't.

00:27:58   It'll look different.

00:27:59   You'll be able to tell at a glance that it's the new Air.

00:28:01   And I'm excited by that just like I was excited

00:28:04   by the M1 iMac, because it is not that common

00:28:09   when Apple takes a product, a Mac product,

00:28:13   and completely changes its exterior.

00:28:15   Usually it sort of, it does it,

00:28:17   and then it keeps it for a while.

00:28:19   And we're starting to see with Apple Silicon

00:28:21   the opportunity for Apple to finally

00:28:23   get some of these changes out there.

00:28:24   So I think that'll be the new MacBook Air.

00:28:27   Otherwise, I'm gonna, and it's boring predictions,

00:28:30   But I think that there will be a big iMac

00:28:32   and it will be called iMac Pro.

00:28:34   I think it will come in boring color options

00:28:36   and not the bright color options

00:28:37   because that's a very Apple thing to do.

00:28:39   Maybe they'll have some colors

00:28:40   but there'll be boring iPhone Pro kind of colors.

00:28:43   That's the old, you know, midnight lemon kind of thing

00:28:45   where it's just all forest green and, you know,

00:28:49   midnight blue and other things that are almost the same.

00:28:53   Maybe it'll come in black.

00:28:54   That would be great if it was truly in black

00:28:56   and not just a space gray.

00:28:58   But I think that they'll use what they call Pro colors,

00:29:00   which is to say not colors that are very interesting.

00:29:04   But I think they'll call it a Pro

00:29:06   and that it'll offer the Pro processor options

00:29:09   that are in the MacBook Pros

00:29:12   and maybe even offer like a dual,

00:29:15   maybe not a quad like the Mac Pro,

00:29:17   but maybe even a dual M1 Max option that'll cost a fortune,

00:29:22   but it'll be super powerful.

00:29:25   We'll see.

00:29:25   And it'll look different.

00:29:26   I think it'll look more like the M1 iMac, but I don't think it's gonna be all snazzy

00:29:31   like that.

00:29:32   And I do believe they'll replace the Mac Mini with a Mac Mini Pro, too.

00:29:35   That Intel Mac Mini will get replaced by another kind of dark gray Mac Mini that has a better

00:29:42   cooling system and options for Pro and Mac chips for people who want that.

00:29:47   Obviously, we've mentioned it.

00:29:48   It's been mentioned everywhere to death, I think, at this point, but displays, yay?

00:29:52   Yes.

00:29:53   Yeah.

00:29:54   It's gonna happen.

00:29:55   And then in these Macworld columns,

00:29:57   one of the things that I love

00:29:58   is that I ended up picking the same thing,

00:30:00   predicting the same thing year after year after year.

00:30:01   I predicted the year of Apple Silicon

00:30:03   three times in a row before it happened.

00:30:05   I predicted that external display three times.

00:30:07   So I'm just gonna keep predicting it until it happens.

00:30:09   But I really do,

00:30:10   before it was sort of like tinted with wish casting

00:30:13   and now it's just straight up, it's gonna happen.

00:30:16   - I mean, also it was just like, this is logical, right?

00:30:18   Like it was like, they should do this.

00:30:20   So I'm gonna predict it because if I think they should do it,

00:30:22   surely they should think it too.

00:30:23   - Right, and that doesn't always work out,

00:30:25   but I think this year, and Germin, again, here,

00:30:27   has said they're absolutely doing this.

00:30:30   I don't know what, if I had to guess,

00:30:32   my guess is going to be that they're going to do two.

00:30:35   I think they're gonna do a 27

00:30:37   that is essentially the same display

00:30:39   that's gonna be in the iMac Pro.

00:30:41   It's gonna be a micro LED,

00:30:42   and I think Germin said half the price

00:30:45   of the Pro Display XDR,

00:30:46   so we're talking about a $2,500 display.

00:30:49   Not cheap, but--

00:30:52   - Better.

00:30:53   better. It makes you wonder what the price of the iMac Pro is going to start at, and my guess is

00:30:58   going to be probably like $2,500, $2,700 is where it's going to start, somewhere in there. It's not

00:31:02   going to be cheap. I mean that was never a cheap computer, right? Like the iMac Pro. The 27-inch,

00:31:07   even the 27-inch iMac was not like, that's not your low price leader, and quite honestly the

00:31:11   24-inch iMac is is gorgeous. And so I think that that will exist, and I do think they're going to

00:31:17   update the Pro Display XDR to be a micro LED, you know, basically to do all the things that

00:31:24   it is lacking now that are in its laptops where the laptop has a better screen than

00:31:28   their $5,000 monitor. Do you mean mini or micro? Oh, sorry, whatever it is. Mini is

00:31:33   what we have now in other-- Mini display. Because I think that that is also a standard.

00:31:38   Right, micro LED is in the Apple Watch, I think, they're working on. That was a rumor

00:31:43   that they wanted to do that for some other devices, but yeah, it's a mini-LED. It's the

00:31:47   M1, or sorry, it's the MacBook Pro display technology. I think they're gonna roll that

00:31:52   out everywhere. And it's gonna cost. But, so I do think they will end up with a Pro

00:31:58   Display XDR replacement and a 27-inch standalone that everybody will complain about how much

00:32:06   it costs and then everybody will buy it. It's a bold prediction, but I do think it's gonna

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00:34:23   I wrote down in the document "A Quiet Year for the iPhone" because that was kind of a thing that you

00:34:27   you were mentioning in your article, right?

00:34:31   It's not gonna be the bigger.

00:34:32   But then I started like thinking about it

00:34:34   and looking around, I don't think this is gonna be

00:34:37   a quiet year for the iPhone.

00:34:38   So here's three things here, right?

00:34:41   One is we're gonna see another shake up in the product line

00:34:45   because the expectation is that a iPhone 14 Max

00:34:50   will enter the line, replacing the Mini,

00:34:55   which is kind of hilarious really,

00:34:57   'cause it's not really replacing it,

00:34:59   but it's taking the spot that the Mini will be leaving

00:35:02   as the Mini leaves the product line.

00:35:04   Which is interesting to me.

00:35:07   I mean, it's gonna be kind of fascinating to see really.

00:35:10   Like will the iPhone 14 Max sell more units

00:35:14   than the iPhone 14, an iPhone 14 Mini would?

00:35:19   I think the answer to that is yes, personally.

00:35:21   Which is why they would do it, otherwise why, you know.

00:35:25   'Cause I think I heard someone say this recently,

00:35:27   I don't remember where it was, and I thought it was smart,

00:35:29   really, of like, at the moment, if you want a big phone,

00:35:32   you have to spend the most amount of money.

00:35:34   -But that's my counterargument, is how many people buy the Pro Max,

00:35:38   not because they want a Pro but they want a big phone,

00:35:40   and how much are they losing?

00:35:42   And that's the calculation there, is if you do an iPhone Max

00:35:46   that's not Pro, you are gonna get some people to buy it

00:35:50   who would otherwise not,

00:35:51   but you're also gonna lose some people

00:35:53   who would have bought the Pro Max

00:35:54   and now feel like they don't need to.

00:35:56   - But I mean, I would wonder if that is the same amount

00:35:59   of people that will buy it because they also want

00:36:01   whatever features the pro one gets.

00:36:03   I don't know, we're gonna assume that there are people

00:36:06   smarter than us at Apple who are making those decisions

00:36:09   and this is what they do. - It's their whole job.

00:36:10   There are literally people, it's their entire job

00:36:13   to make that calculation.

00:36:14   - There are teams of people, right?

00:36:15   - Yeah, you're right. - Teams upon teams of people

00:36:17   whose entire jobs as it works out.

00:36:19   So if they do it, you've got to assume,

00:36:21   and I know, I know, I know, like I can already hear

00:36:24   the sound of emails being opened.

00:36:26   I know that every single person who has an iPhone mini

00:36:30   is gonna be really mad and upset about it.

00:36:32   Hello, Jason's one of those people who've been in an email

00:36:34   to me, but the thing is, Apple's a business.

00:36:38   They do not do these things for your pleasure, personally.

00:36:41   - How dare you?

00:36:42   - No one's buying them relatively, right?

00:36:46   If they were selling like hundreds of millions

00:36:50   of iPhone minis, they wouldn't get rid of them, right?

00:36:52   Like it's a product I think that has underwhelmed

00:36:55   and expectation and they are like going back and thinking,

00:36:58   hey, we used to do this non a billion dollars big phone

00:37:02   and sold so many of those.

00:37:04   So why don't we bring that back into the line?

00:37:06   - I suspect that the sales performance of the mini

00:37:09   opened up the conversation of like,

00:37:11   could we try something else in that fourth slot?

00:37:13   Especially if you think about it this way.

00:37:15   And when I talk about a quiet year for the iPhone,

00:37:17   one of the reasons I talk about that is iPhone design

00:37:20   is on like a three year cycle at this point.

00:37:22   So, and you see it in the sales charts.

00:37:25   We talked about it in terms of,

00:37:26   when you look at their sales over time,

00:37:28   there is actually an iPhone cycle,

00:37:30   and it's the design cycle where the iPhone 12 comes out

00:37:34   and there's a huge sales spike

00:37:36   because it's a brand new look for a phone.

00:37:38   And then 13 and 14 will be less.

00:37:41   And that's why it's a quiet year in a sense,

00:37:43   is that it's not gonna look any different.

00:37:45   And so you're not gonna have that huge pent-up demand

00:37:48   'cause I think a lot of people are just on the,

00:37:50   it's a new iPhone look buying cycle every three years or so.

00:37:54   So leaving that behind for a second,

00:37:57   your Apple and you look at the mini for the iPhone 12

00:38:00   and you look at the sales and you're like,

00:38:01   it's not great.

00:38:03   And you say, well, it's too late for 13.

00:38:06   We're already locked in 'cause Apple is working way ahead.

00:38:08   We're already locked in for 13.

00:38:10   Let's do an experiment for 14.

00:38:15   Let's see if this other approach would work

00:38:18   and we'll get some data on it.

00:38:19   And then, you know, they're still gonna have to be working

00:38:21   on whatever the 15 design is

00:38:23   before they get that data probably.

00:38:24   But I think they looked at this as an opportunity

00:38:29   to do something different.

00:38:30   I wonder if in the long run,

00:38:32   what they're gonna decide to do instead

00:38:34   is make the iPhone whatever a little smaller

00:38:39   than today's iPhone whatever.

00:38:41   - Oh, the regular?

00:38:43   - Yeah, and make the iPhone max

00:38:46   if they decide to keep it bigger,

00:38:48   but more like 10R size so that you have two sizes,

00:38:53   but they're not exactly matched to the Pro sizes.

00:38:57   Or if they're gonna just say,

00:38:58   like, let's just keep this easy.

00:38:59   They're literally the two phone sizes.

00:39:02   - What I would say is I could imagine maybe like

00:39:04   the 14 year is a test for 15 year

00:39:08   as to whether they adjust it again.

00:39:10   Because that's a redesign, you know?

00:39:12   And that's like what you're saying,

00:39:14   like they maybe try and keep it a few years

00:39:17   so they can get the most out of each design.

00:39:19   If they just start changing the physical sizes again,

00:39:22   well, you may as well just go back to the drawing board

00:39:24   'cause you've made it way harder for yourself,

00:39:25   but we'll find out.

00:39:26   But here's something interesting.

00:39:29   Mark Gurman says, "Whole punch display,"

00:39:31   in probably the pro models.

00:39:33   Now that's gonna be a big deal.

00:39:35   That's no notch anymore.

00:39:37   - Yeah, I mean, I don't think the notch is a big deal,

00:39:40   so I don't think it's a big deal.

00:39:42   - I mean, but just from a visual perspective, right?

00:39:44   Like, you know, like when they're, from, from,

00:39:46   it's, they're gonna make a big deal out of that, right?

00:39:49   Like, look how incredible our gorgeous display,

00:39:51   you know, like it's gonna be,

00:39:52   they make a big deal out of everything.

00:39:54   But that's gonna be cool, I think.

00:39:55   And so the, the Face ID sensors will be going

00:39:58   under the display, is the expectation there.

00:40:02   And Ming-Chi Kuo says that there will be

00:40:06   a 48 megapixel camera on probably the Pro.

00:40:10   Now this is interesting because Apple has been using

00:40:12   24 megapixel camera for a really long time. Like years and years and years

00:40:17   they've kind of been pretty stuck on 24 megapixels and I'm happy that they will

00:40:21   go up because I sometimes want a bit more sharpness or a bit more detail out

00:40:26   of my iPhone photos and so I would welcome this change so that's

00:40:33   gonna be pretty cool I think. Yeah okay so again if this is all predicated on me

00:40:38   saying it's a quiet year for the iPhone which I think is a simple way of doing

00:40:42   it's not going to be, depends on who you're talking to, right?

00:40:45   - Yeah.

00:40:45   - There's not going to be a revolutionary new iPhone.

00:40:48   Everybody who follows the iPhone closely

00:40:50   knows how this goes, right?

00:40:51   They change the outside.

00:40:52   Everybody freaks out.

00:40:53   They're like, "Oh my God, it's a new iPhone.

00:40:55   I'm going to buy it."

00:40:56   And then the next year they iterate

00:40:57   and it's a little bit better.

00:40:58   And the next year they iterate and it's better.

00:41:00   And somewhere in those two other iterations,

00:41:02   you know what happens is there are huge internal upgrades.

00:41:05   - Can I just, because I've already got a bunch of people

00:41:07   saying, I just want to try and stop before again,

00:41:10   more tweets, 12 megapixels, not 24, that they've had for years, and now we've got 48. So that'd

00:41:15   be a big difference. Big, big difference.

00:41:16   Big difference. And this is what they do, right? This is what they do, is it doesn't

00:41:20   change on the outside, and then all the reviews come out and they're like, "I know it doesn't

00:41:23   look any different, but this is a huge change to the camera." And that's what they do. They

00:41:27   don't tend to put all of their massive changes in one revision, including the exterior, and

00:41:34   then let it not change at all for two years, right? Instead, it's all kind of coming in

00:41:39   sequence. And so a much better camera in the third year of the phone body, not surprising

00:41:46   and actually, I mean, and it's great. Like that's great because in some ways, the camera

00:41:51   is the biggest motivator for some people. Some people it's the outside shape and some

00:41:56   people it's the camera. And, and I like that, that, that 48 megapixel rumor because the

00:42:03   other thing that's happening if we want to talk about 2023 for a moment is the iPhone

00:42:09   15 seems to be where they're finally going to do the periscope thing.

00:42:13   Yeah and that's going to require a huge redesign of the phone.

00:42:17   Entire rethink I mean I can hear them talking about it now even though it's going to be

00:42:20   fall of the 23 but it's an entire rethink of the interior of the iPhone because they

00:42:24   want to increase the focal length which means they have to bounce the light off of a mirror

00:42:27   and then run it down to the camera in the body of the phone.

00:42:32   And that's gonna be really good, I think,

00:42:36   in terms of really changing what Apple can do

00:42:38   with photography on the iPhone.

00:42:41   But that's a 23 thing.

00:42:43   In the meantime, what can you do?

00:42:45   And the answer is, well, presumably that phone

00:42:47   is gonna have an amazing sensor on it.

00:42:49   The sensor is gonna happen maybe this year, right?

00:42:52   We'll get the sensor, that awesome sensor this year,

00:42:55   and then next year they will upgrade the optics.

00:42:57   and it's just more Apple iteration going on. But even in the existing phone design, having that

00:43:04   new sensor will be, and I'm sure they're gonna, if it's a 48 megapixel camera, like they're gonna

00:43:10   do all sorts of very clever software stuff to it, where they can say, well, you know, it's not just

00:43:17   about the megapixels, it's really about how we use those pixels to process the image, etc, etc.

00:43:21   Deep focus, sweaters, etc. Yeah, this is gonna give me the opportunity to just say something

00:43:25   something's been annoying me. I think deep fusion, whatever it's called.

00:43:29   Oh sorry, deep fusion.

00:43:30   I mean it could be called deep focus, I don't remember, because they also have fusion drives.

00:43:36   That processing where they increase the sharpness is ruining some photos of mine. Like just

00:43:42   ruining them. It adds like a darkness to images or over, it's like over sharpening them. And

00:43:49   this has been going on for a while and I'm just really unhappy with some images. Like

00:43:54   I take a photo, I look at it and I'm happy with it and then a split second later it does

00:43:59   the processing and it is just really ruining some photos of mine and I can't do anything

00:44:05   about it, right?

00:44:06   And so I would really love the 48 megapixel camera because I think they will then have

00:44:12   to rely on this less because that's all about adding detail and sharpness to images.

00:44:18   I think sometimes it's doing that at the expense of color and clarity.

00:44:24   So I'll be excited for an improvement there.

00:44:28   Anyway.

00:44:29   That's the iPhone.

00:44:30   iPad.

00:44:31   Mini LED for the 11-inch iPad Pro would be the expectation, right?

00:44:36   That might be the only real big thing for iPad hardware this year?

00:44:41   You know, Mark Gurman talks about updates to the iPads, and he seems to say it in a

00:44:47   in a way that he's more enthusiastic about it than I am.

00:44:51   I think they're gonna not change what they look like at all.

00:44:55   They'll probably get the M2 processor

00:44:58   that's also in the MacBook Air,

00:45:00   and that may enable some stuff

00:45:01   that is not currently enabled.

00:45:02   I do think the standout thing,

00:45:05   and there'll probably be an iPad Air update

00:45:07   at some point this year,

00:45:08   because it's time, it's a little long in the tooth.

00:45:11   But I think the really big development

00:45:13   on the hardware side for the iPad

00:45:14   is gonna be that that 11-inch model gets a mini-LED.

00:45:18   - iPad OS to get a windowed mode

00:45:21   is a thing that you seem pretty in on.

00:45:24   - I keep saying it, and it also still hasn't happened.

00:45:27   This is a little less certain than the display one

00:45:30   and a little more like wish casting is involved,

00:45:33   but I feel like the evidence is there.

00:45:36   And I know you've talked to Federico about this a lot too.

00:45:39   Like the evidence is there.

00:45:41   the multitasking and windowing and pointer support

00:45:46   and keyboard support and keyboard shortcut support.

00:45:51   And like Apple keeps heaping stuff on to iPad OS

00:45:56   that is required if you're going to do

00:46:02   a multi-windowing external display kind of feature.

00:46:07   And that feature doesn't exist yet.

00:46:10   and they got Thunderbolt, you know,

00:46:12   like it's right at the precipice.

00:46:16   So the question is, are they gonna actually do it?

00:46:19   I feel like the release of the display,

00:46:22   external display, would be a great time

00:46:26   for them to announce this.

00:46:28   I don't know if this is an iPad OS next gen feature

00:46:31   or whether it's more like the pointer

00:46:33   and it comes in the spring or something

00:46:36   as a update to the existing iPad OS.

00:46:39   I don't know that part,

00:46:41   but I feel like they've been pushing this

00:46:43   all this time to get to this point.

00:46:46   And I do think iPadOS needs to be unchained in this way.

00:46:49   I do think that we need to reach the point

00:46:51   where if you can attach an iPad to an external display,

00:46:55   look, we've already got a pointing device,

00:46:57   we've already got a keyboard,

00:47:00   we've already got a multi-window support,

00:47:03   and like we've already got floating windows in some apps,

00:47:07   Like all the pieces are there.

00:47:10   So they just need to take that last step,

00:47:13   which is I plug this into a big screen

00:47:15   and I can drag around a bunch of iPad windows

00:47:19   and run it from my iPad.

00:47:21   Like I do think they like all the evidence is there

00:47:25   that they're going there,

00:47:26   but they have to take that final step.

00:47:27   So I'm gonna say this year is the year

00:47:29   just because they've gotten everything aligned

00:47:32   and they're going to do an external display.

00:47:35   and I feel like that's the perfect time to talk about it

00:47:38   is here's your iPad Pro

00:47:39   and here's your new Apple Pro display and boom.

00:47:43   - One of the things I just read to put this as a quote

00:47:45   because you seem to say this

00:47:47   as if you were very confident of it.

00:47:48   One of the major features of iOS 16

00:47:50   will be a new version of Notes that allows cross-linking.

00:47:54   - Yeah, I think it's gonna happen.

00:47:55   I just, I think the Notes team,

00:47:59   which is pretty active and paying attention,

00:48:01   has seen all the excitement about Notion

00:48:05   and Rome and Obsidian and all the rest,

00:48:10   all of these fancy note-taking apps

00:48:12   that let you interlink your notes.

00:48:14   And I think that Apple is going to do their take

00:48:18   on a knowledge base like that.

00:48:22   And I think it will be something that will frustrate

00:48:24   all the fans of those apps because it will not be

00:48:27   as complex as that for lots of reasons,

00:48:30   but that's Apple's stock and trade really with this stuff

00:48:34   is how do we bring the desire to do that to the masses

00:48:37   in a sort of a simplified form?

00:48:39   But I think it's gonna happen

00:48:40   because it's just laying right out there.

00:48:42   If you're on the Notes team

00:48:43   and you're looking at the trend in your world,

00:48:45   which is Notes apps, how could you miss this one?

00:48:49   So I think they're gonna do it.

00:48:50   And it makes sense.

00:48:51   Like I should be able to link from one note to another note.

00:48:54   Like even if you don't know anything about those other apps,

00:48:56   it totally makes sense to say this is in that other note

00:48:59   and be able to create a little link to it.

00:49:01   So I think that's gonna happen.

00:49:03   - I totally agree with your thinking,

00:49:05   that it's like this is the thing now that you do

00:49:08   if you're in one of these kinds of applications

00:49:10   and then VCs pour money all over you.

00:49:12   So it's become like a thing that

00:49:13   a lot of these applications are doing,

00:49:15   but that means it's becoming a standard of the space.

00:49:17   So probably it makes sense for Apple to do it too, right?

00:49:20   But in a less powerful way,

00:49:23   they will do it in the most basic way possible.

00:49:26   - Yes, yeah.

00:49:27   It will be, it's not gonna be Sherlocking, right?

00:49:30   It's gonna be once again what Apple really does,

00:49:33   which is they make a kind of popularization of a feature

00:49:38   that is never gonna bring the power

00:49:41   that the other apps have,

00:49:43   but it will give the masses who don't use those apps,

00:49:46   but just use the Apple Notes app,

00:49:48   a little taste of that goodness.

00:49:50   - Or people like Myke who find that feature interesting,

00:49:54   but really complicated in every app that he's tried it in.

00:49:56   - Yeah, yeah, and I do so much in Notes already,

00:50:00   and I would love that feature there.

00:50:02   And yet, that's not enough for me

00:50:04   to go to a different Notes app, so I stay in Notes.

00:50:07   But if Notes added it, I'd be like,

00:50:08   "Oh yeah, I'll probably use that to interlink some Notes.

00:50:11   "That'll be great."

00:50:12   So I think they'll do it.

00:50:14   - And you also refuse to give up in your Mac call column

00:50:17   of predicting a new Pro app for the iPad from Apple.

00:50:21   - Gonna keep on doing it.

00:50:22   This is the year.

00:50:24   This is the year. - So it's like

00:50:24   way into three drafts this year. It is. It is. I just, I think it's gotta happen eventually,

00:50:33   right? I really do believe that there is probably, at the very least, Final Cut Pro for the iPad

00:50:39   happening. I just have to believe. I have to believe it. So I'm gonna choose it. Do

00:50:45   you think this year we are going to see anything new for the home from Apple? I think there

00:50:53   was a prediction in that episode of Connected that we're not really talking about this.

00:51:00   And I like the idea of predicting a new home product from Apple because you keep it—and

00:51:08   we're not competing here on this—but that idea—I think Apple does have a home strategy.

00:51:12   I think they have found a home strategy, and I think we saw the beginning of it with the

00:51:15   HomePod mini. I do think they are going in a new direction with this, between this and

00:51:22   being part of the Matter Alliance,

00:51:24   and I know that's been slow to come to fruition,

00:51:26   but I do think they are getting their ducks in a row

00:51:30   regarding the home.

00:51:32   There have been reports,

00:51:33   including from friend of the show, Mark Gurman, about this.

00:51:36   I think the most likely home product from them

00:51:40   is a HomePod with a screen and a camera

00:51:45   that lives, I guess, lives in your kitchen,

00:51:48   but really can live wherever you want.

00:51:50   And the reason I say that is,

00:51:52   Look, they've got tvOS, they've got iPadOS,

00:51:54   and they've got iOS.

00:51:55   They've got center stage.

00:51:57   They've got the HomePod.

00:51:58   - They've got photos, memories.

00:52:00   - They got photos, memories.

00:52:01   They got widgets.

00:52:02   - They got FaceTime.

00:52:03   - They have every single, it's a little bit like my comment

00:52:05   about the iPad external display thing.

00:52:08   They have FaceTime.

00:52:09   They have, and they have app developers, right?

00:52:11   So they, which is something,

00:52:12   as somebody who has an Amazon Echo, like, oh boy,

00:52:16   like they're so, the Amazon app store on their Fire,

00:52:21   devices, their Fire TV devices, has everything, and it's Fire OS that runs the Amazon Echo,

00:52:29   and they have nothing, almost nothing. I saw they added like Zoom the other day, but it's

00:52:34   like all curated. And I think Apple has every opportunity to get in here and make a product

00:52:40   that using a lot of the building blocks of what they've already got, probably mostly

00:52:44   TV OS and build a HomePod with a screen that will let you do FaceTime, that will

00:52:52   let you set up widgets that will all sync via iCloud with your other devices,

00:52:55   that will be controllable via the Lady but also by via the touchscreen, and

00:53:00   it'll have a center stage camera on it so that you can, wherever you are, you

00:53:04   just place it there and it's your FaceTime appliance. I really think that

00:53:07   product is gonna happen because, again, all the pieces are there and it's a

00:53:12   natural new direction for Apple to go in the home that I think could actually be a good

00:53:20   successful product. Plus I think Apple's whole privacy promise and all the people who are

00:53:24   in Apple's ecosystem saying, "Well, you know, you're not going to have to give your data

00:53:28   to Google, Amazon, or Facebook, but instead we will protect your privacy when you have

00:53:34   this microphone and camera in your home and it works with all your other stuff and it

00:53:38   lets you call your friends who have, you know, your family members who have an iPad or an

00:53:42   iPhone, they don't have to get set up with Amazon's thing or Google's thing. So I think

00:53:48   that that, you know, I want to hold that hope that they're going to do the soundbar product

00:53:51   that I've been complaining about for a long time that's basically an Apple TV with a speaker

00:53:55   and a center stage camera that you put by your TV and now boom, you've got the same

00:53:59   thing but you've got it on your TV. I think that's less likely.

00:54:04   It is much more likely that they make a HomePod screen,

00:54:09   'cause that has so much in their wheelhouse.

00:54:11   And it stands, yeah, it stands alone in a way

00:54:13   that an Apple TV speaker thing is a new thing,

00:54:18   and they have to check what they want it to be, right?

00:54:22   Like, is this a category we wanna be in?

00:54:25   But like, a HomePod with a screen,

00:54:27   like, it's just sitting right there.

00:54:30   And they've got, I personally think Center Stage

00:54:33   was built for this product.

00:54:36   I think center stage is gonna be everywhere.

00:54:38   It's gonna be on Macs.

00:54:39   I think it's gonna be, it's just on iPads right now,

00:54:42   but I think it was built for this product.

00:54:43   Like it feels like it was built for a product like this.

00:54:45   'Cause you need, iPad you can pick up and move around, right?

00:54:49   But one of these things is gonna be sitting somewhere.

00:54:52   And what you really need with a device

00:54:55   that is static like that is a dynamic widescreen camera

00:54:59   that can pan around.

00:55:01   And so I think that center stage,

00:55:03   we saw it first on the iPad,

00:55:05   but I think it's built for this product.

00:55:07   I really believe that.

00:55:08   So maybe I'm wrong, but I'm outside the black box.

00:55:12   I don't get to look inside and see what's going on at Apple.

00:55:14   I just have to guess,

00:55:15   but it feels very strong to me that that's the product.

00:55:18   - And finally, is 2022 the year of the headset?

00:55:22   - I say, yes.

00:55:25   I think Apple will release something

00:55:26   that you put on your face in 2022.

00:55:31   I do. I am really skeptical. So our friend James Thompson went all in on that episode of Connected

00:55:41   with AR stuff. I'm a little like I'm a believer in this product. I think it's gonna happen.

00:55:46   Whether I'm a believer in its success, I don't know, but I believe it will happen.

00:55:49   You believe that the Apple's gonna make it.

00:55:51   I think the goggles or whatever it is, I think it'll be 22. I think it's gonna ship.

00:56:00   I don't think it's gonna be pitched as a product for everyone.

00:56:05   Uh-huh.

00:56:06   I feel like it's gonna be so expensive and so early days that they're gonna pitch it for developers,

00:56:16   that they'll announce it at WWDC, and they'll say, "This is coming. It's a developer kit.

00:56:21   We want you all to write apps for it." And then next year, there'll be one for the masses,

00:56:27   and that next year it won't be that one. It'll be another model that's for the masses.

00:56:30   It's certainly possible that Apple will do that and say it is for the masses, and developers can

00:56:36   get their hands on a developer kit. Maybe the developer kit is just a thing that you have to

00:56:40   plug into a Mac that is a, you know, it's like part of it but not the whole story, and then they'll

00:56:46   ship the real one in the fall. But if I had to lay down money, I would lay down money. That first one

00:56:53   is not gonna be, like people will be able to buy it,

00:56:57   but that it's not gonna be pitched for regular people,

00:56:59   because I think it's gonna be two early days,

00:57:01   and I think Apple's not gonna want to try and say,

00:57:06   put this under the Christmas tree, right?

00:57:08   I think it may be gonna be a little too early for that.

00:57:10   Could be wrong about that, but I,

00:57:13   so I'm gonna try to stake out this middle ground

00:57:15   where I think it is gonna happen,

00:57:16   but I think it's gonna be not quite ready

00:57:18   for the masses until 23.

00:57:21   - Yeah, I can't decide on this,

00:57:22   just hearing you talk about it,

00:57:24   I can't yet put my finger on what I think they'll do

00:57:28   because anything they announce,

00:57:31   it will be the thing that people think is for everyone.

00:57:34   Doesn't matter what they do or how they say it,

00:57:36   it just does not matter.

00:57:37   If they release a thing and they're like,

00:57:40   this is an early days product for us, it costs $3,000,

00:57:44   they will just be like, Apple's headset,

00:57:46   Oculus competitor costs $3,000.

00:57:49   There's no way around it.

00:57:51   - That's not entirely true though

00:57:52   Because if they announce it and say,

00:57:53   we're announcing this, there's a developer kit hardware

00:57:55   that's gonna be available this summer,

00:57:57   we love our developers,

00:57:58   and next year we will be shipping a product to consumers.

00:58:01   And they completely just say, this is a developer kit.

00:58:05   We're not selling this to the general public.

00:58:08   They could get away with it.

00:58:09   But yeah, I agree, the temptation is gonna be strong.

00:58:11   - The other part of what I didn't mention is I just,

00:58:15   I also struggle to like, 'cause again, I just can't decide,

00:58:18   can I imagine that they would announce it that way?

00:58:20   would I imagine that they would only be able to announce something like that, or they only would announce something like this,

00:58:25   if they also showed off what the consumer product will be.

00:58:28   Right. Well, this is—

00:58:29   Like, I can't decide.

00:58:31   Their classic way of doing it would be that, right?

00:58:33   Which is, the challenge is, how do you get your developers to write really what need to be new apps,

00:58:38   or at least dramatically changed apps to support AR?

00:58:41   And I know they've been doing it on the iPhone for a long time,

00:58:44   and so those things will be able to be picked up.

00:58:46   But the question is really how much do the developers think

00:58:50   they can get something done without really having access

00:58:54   to this until it's essentially on shelves

00:58:57   for the general public.

00:58:58   And that's a tough one, but it's certainly possible.

00:59:01   And the way you do it if you're Apple, honestly,

00:59:03   is you pitch it as an Oculus Quest, right?

00:59:05   You pitch it as a VR gaming thing

00:59:09   and say it's the start and this is gonna be great for games

00:59:14   and we've got all these developers

00:59:15   who are working on games and they'll,

00:59:17   more game demos for Apple events, woo-hoo.

00:59:19   - Games and experiences, right?

00:59:21   Like that's gonna be V1.

00:59:22   - Yeah, but it'll be expensive

00:59:24   and what they're really kind of doing is they're hedging

00:59:27   and then saying it's, you know, it is out now,

00:59:29   but you know, but then they'll iterate

00:59:32   and iterate and iterate and that's very Apple.

00:59:34   I think that's the most like what they've done in the past.

00:59:36   I just, I do wonder if they will get to the point

00:59:39   where they're like, we cannot ship this

00:59:41   to the general public, they will kill us.

00:59:43   let's call this the developer kit.

00:59:46   'Cause we know that they're already

00:59:47   developing the next one, right?

00:59:48   Mark Gurman has that report,

00:59:50   that he's reporting on specs for the 23 version

00:59:54   of the AR headset, right?

00:59:55   So the question is, is the 22 version a developer kit,

00:59:58   or is it a product for consumers?

01:00:00   And I don't know, if I had to pick,

01:00:03   I wanna be a little conservative here and say developer kit,

01:00:06   'cause I'm not entirely convinced

01:00:08   that Apple is gonna have a product this year,

01:00:11   but they might, they could do it.

01:00:13   it would be very Apple to put the burden on all developers

01:00:16   to just figure it out.

01:00:17   - And I still wonder,

01:00:21   like again, I go back and forth on this,

01:00:23   if they'll even show this off at WWDC,

01:00:25   like I kind of feel like they might take the Apple Watch

01:00:29   approach of two events,

01:00:32   so like that are absolutely focused on,

01:00:36   they said that, you know, they did the,

01:00:37   here's the thing event,

01:00:39   and then like six months later,

01:00:41   here is the, we're gonna remind you

01:00:43   and actually launch the product

01:00:44   and show you what it is now event.

01:00:47   - So let me give you a scenario.

01:00:49   This might be the actual scenario,

01:00:51   which is what if at WWDC,

01:00:54   they announced that they're going to do an AR product

01:00:56   and they show off the AR product.

01:00:58   And they say the AR product is shipping this fall.

01:01:01   And they announced it at WWDC

01:01:05   or maybe before then or maybe after then,

01:01:07   but they announced it at an event, let's just say.

01:01:09   They announced it at an event.

01:01:11   And as part of that event, what they announce is,

01:01:13   developers can get something.

01:01:16   And maybe that something is the hardware in advance,

01:01:21   or maybe that something is,

01:01:23   like I said earlier in this conversation,

01:01:26   a not quite the hardware, but something you can attach.

01:01:30   - A HTC Vive you can plug in.

01:01:34   I mean, it could be something like that, right?

01:01:36   - Yeah, right, something where you're basically like,

01:01:38   we're gonna give developers something

01:01:39   that they can plug into a Mac and develop their apps with.

01:01:44   Because that's the part that keeps coming back to me

01:01:48   is how do you launch this product

01:01:51   without having developers actually be able to use

01:01:54   this product or a thing that is meant

01:01:57   to emulate this product?

01:01:59   So that's my question is, you know,

01:02:02   and maybe it's as simple as they're gonna ship products

01:02:05   to developers and there's gonna be like a $3,000 deposit

01:02:09   and that gets refunded or they get store credit

01:02:11   or whatever at the end of the process

01:02:13   and it's locked to their ID and, you know,

01:02:16   they could do it that way.

01:02:18   And it's not quite the final,

01:02:20   but it's something for developers.

01:02:21   I don't know.

01:02:22   Like it's a good question.

01:02:24   Like we'll have a limited number

01:02:26   and you'll have to qualify

01:02:27   and they could do it that way too.

01:02:28   But I get hung up on the developer part of this

01:02:30   'cause I don't think they can just dump this on the world

01:02:32   and say, "Hey, developers make great AR apps on the iPhone

01:02:36   and they'll just work."

01:02:37   Like, I don't think that's gonna do it.

01:02:39   So I need the rest of that story

01:02:41   because they wanna launch this platform

01:02:42   with good apps on it.

01:02:44   And they can't surprise the developers and do that.

01:02:47   So that's the thing to watch honestly,

01:02:49   in all of this is what,

01:02:50   if they're launching a brand new platform,

01:02:52   what is the developer story gonna be

01:02:53   and how do they prime the pump with developers,

01:02:56   assuming that their AR kit demos the last five years

01:03:01   are not seen as priming the pump.

01:03:03   - Well, the only thing we have to compare this to

01:03:06   is the Apple watch, right?

01:03:08   like in recent times, like the only product,

01:03:11   like brand new product needs development,

01:03:13   new operating system, the whole nine yards.

01:03:17   And with the Apple Watch,

01:03:18   they said they did those two separate events

01:03:20   and they also did the thing where they brought developers in

01:03:25   for a few days, you remember that?

01:03:27   - Right, oh sure, sure.

01:03:28   - And that was how people got to try out their software

01:03:33   on Apple hardware.

01:03:36   - Right.

01:03:37   - The reason I'm saying this,

01:03:38   'cause like James is saying in the chat,

01:03:40   be kind of like how they did the DTK,

01:03:43   not the fastest chip but functional.

01:03:45   But there isn't like the DTK was a Mac mini

01:03:47   where they put a different,

01:03:49   the Apple do not have something.

01:03:51   - Here's the one thing that,

01:03:52   and David pointed this out in the chat

01:03:55   and I think he's right, which is,

01:03:56   the other way they could go is they could say,

01:03:59   we're gonna do a little iPhone holder

01:04:02   that you put on your face, like the Google Daydream.

01:04:04   And you can build your apps on that.

01:04:06   (laughing)

01:04:08   And then they'll be great on the new hardware

01:04:09   'cause it'll be more powerful than your iPhone.

01:04:11   - They may also do a thing where they say,

01:04:12   and some of you can apply to come to a kitchen

01:04:16   and we will let you load it onto pre-release hardware

01:04:20   provided you signed a 25,000 page embargo, like NDA.

01:04:24   'Cause like, this is my issue with the,

01:04:27   is what they're announcing, right?

01:04:29   Like, are they actually going to be announcing something

01:04:32   that will be available for anyone to buy

01:04:34   at the end of the year?

01:04:35   If that's the case, they're not sending those to developers

01:04:38   six months in advance because it's not done.

01:04:41   So I don't know how, you see,

01:04:44   like I'm struggling with this balance here.

01:04:46   - That's why, I mean, but it could be done,

01:04:48   the hardware could be done and the software could be broken

01:04:50   and it could be very much a DTK kind of situation

01:04:53   where it's just for, it's non-final hardware,

01:04:56   but they're building 2000 of them to send out.

01:05:00   - All the DTKs were like, they were existing hardware

01:05:05   that they put new guts inside.

01:05:07   And Apple doesn't have existing AR headset hardware.

01:05:11   - Yeah, well, this is, so this is the thing.

01:05:13   - We're gonna argue this for the next six months, right?

01:05:15   This is the conversation of the year.

01:05:17   - 'Cause I do think that there will be something

01:05:19   you put on your face this year.

01:05:21   The question is, what form does it take

01:05:23   and what the developer story is about it.

01:05:26   That's the great, and Apple has options here.

01:05:28   I think in the end, it comes down to Apple's confidence

01:05:31   level in two things, confidence level

01:05:33   in the quality of the product,

01:05:34   and confidence level in the developer story.

01:05:38   And, you know, they could be misguided about those things.

01:05:41   But I do think in the end,

01:05:41   those are the two things that will decide this.

01:05:43   Is, do they really think this product is enough

01:05:46   of a product to sell it to consumers, you know,

01:05:49   and to take the hits of it being judged

01:05:51   as a regular old consumer product?

01:05:53   Which they might, they might be like,

01:05:55   you know, we always iterate.

01:05:57   This first one is gonna be great,

01:05:58   but the next one's gonna be vastly better,

01:06:00   just like the Apple Watch.

01:06:02   You iterate for a few years and it gets way better.

01:06:04   But the question is, is it enough yet?

01:06:08   And I think, you know, the truth is that Apple cares more

01:06:12   about being seen in public than it cares about developers.

01:06:15   Sorry, developers, you know it's true.

01:06:17   And so it's a hard, I have a hard time imagining

01:06:20   that Apple wouldn't announce something

01:06:22   and ship something the same year

01:06:23   because everybody would be talking about it

01:06:27   and they wouldn't have a product.

01:06:28   So, so yeah, I think the truth is the biggest,

01:06:31   The best scenario is they'll have some story to tell developers, but they're still going

01:06:34   to ship it by the end of the year.

01:06:35   Yeah, I think it's true.

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01:08:55   of this show and RelayFN. So we spoke about Apple in 2022. Let's speak about what we're

01:09:01   doing in 2022.

01:09:03   Yeah, let's do it.

01:09:05   People might be familiar, you know, like if you listen to one of my other shows, Cortex,

01:09:08   New Year planning and New Year thinking is a pretty important part of my life

01:09:15   now, for many reasons. Me and Grey do a thing called Yearly Themes. We've

01:09:21   been doing it for many many years now, where we come up with a word

01:09:25   or a phrase that acts as a guide for us throughout the year. It's something

01:09:30   that we can look towards and be like "this is something that I want, if I

01:09:33   focus towards this thing it will improve something in my life in some way" and

01:09:37   And then I work out, for me, like I work out a bunch of things that I can do that can ladder up to this idea.

01:09:43   So for me, my theme of 2022 is called the Year of Structure.

01:09:47   I really recommend episode Cortex-123. We speak about all this in more detail.

01:09:52   Yes, highly, I found it incredibly inspirational. It's really good.

01:09:57   Even if you don't normally listen to Cortex, I would say listen to this episode. It's very good.

01:10:02   I appreciate that. Thank you so much.

01:10:03   Basically, for me in 2022, I want to have a better structure in place to handle the

01:10:09   various responsibilities that I have across my businesses and in my personal life, but

01:10:13   also allow for unstructured time because I want to have more time in my work week where

01:10:19   I have big chunks of time where I can work on whatever thing is pulling me at that moment

01:10:23   and really have like clear runway for things.

01:10:27   But this is also at the same time while balancing the things that I want to need to be worked

01:10:31   on.

01:10:32   Usually for me with a yearly theme, I start the year and I just do all of what I want

01:10:40   to do.

01:10:41   So like, you know, I'll be like, oh, okay, I've, my theme is X and that means all what

01:10:45   I need to do is this, this, this, and this, and I'll get what I want.

01:10:47   But the difference for me this time is I'm starting this year.

01:10:51   I know what I want to achieve out of this, but I don't know exactly how to get there.

01:10:56   And so I'm going to be spending a big chunk of the year working out.

01:10:59   All right, some stuff's gonna get cut down

01:11:02   or reorganized or moved around.

01:11:04   How am I gonna do that?

01:11:06   I actually don't know.

01:11:07   And also, I've said this to some close friends recently,

01:11:11   the end of the year is a terrible time to do this

01:11:14   because you've already started on next year's planning.

01:11:16   So I have too many times made wrong decisions

01:11:20   or quick decisions or pulled back on decisions

01:11:24   for things that I wanna cut down

01:11:25   because I'm making these decisions on like December 15th.

01:11:29   So I'm going to be spending at least the first half

01:11:31   of this year working out what stays,

01:11:34   what goes in 2023 for all of the various things that I do,

01:11:38   and then spending the time actually putting those plans

01:11:41   in place to make sure that it's good for next year.

01:11:43   So there's like a bunch of little things

01:11:45   that I'm going to do to help with the immediate,

01:11:47   but then it's also about the future.

01:11:50   -I would argue that this is actually in keeping

01:11:54   with the whole concept of themes,

01:11:56   in that what I like about themes,

01:11:59   and I had to explain themes to Lauren

01:12:00   because we had brunch with you and Adina

01:12:03   and you talked about your themes.

01:12:04   And then we got in the car and we were in the car

01:12:06   for a very, very long time driving back home.

01:12:09   And she was like, "What is this themes business?"

01:12:13   And the way I like to think of the themes is,

01:12:16   it's a framework,

01:12:17   rather than being like New Year's resolutions,

01:12:19   it's a framework that you commit to

01:12:22   to analyze everything you do.

01:12:26   It's a rubric to use to grade every move

01:12:31   you're thinking of making in a year.

01:12:32   It's like, remember structure.

01:12:35   And the beauty of that is that instead of it being you

01:12:38   in sort of saying, here are some goals for the year

01:12:41   in January and seeing if you live up to them.

01:12:43   Instead, you say, this year, really think about

01:12:48   how you wanna structure it or whatever your theme is.

01:12:50   And then everything that comes up during the year,

01:12:53   you begin applying that.

01:12:54   And I think it's, first off,

01:12:55   I think it's easier to internalize that,

01:12:57   although it does take a little time.

01:12:58   And that it also means that it is living with you

01:13:01   because instead of having a thing that you said you would do

01:13:04   and you failed at it,

01:13:05   instead you have this thing on your shoulder

01:13:09   that is sort of evaluating everything you do for the year

01:13:12   through the lens of the theme that you chose.

01:13:14   And so what you did, I think actually,

01:13:17   is it perfectly in keeping with this concept,

01:13:20   which is you've got this theme now

01:13:22   and you don't have your whole plan worked out,

01:13:26   but you're going to spend the year

01:13:28   analyzing everything you do using the theme of structure.

01:13:32   - Yeah, it's just for me,

01:13:34   the ways that I've been doing in recent years,

01:13:36   it's kind of coming from the opposite side,

01:13:38   but it is still, as you very rightly point out,

01:13:41   in keeping with the idea of like,

01:13:43   I've referred to it as like a North Star for a while.

01:13:46   It's like, it's something that just guides you.

01:13:48   So yeah, this kind of where I am,

01:13:50   where I'm like, basically I just noticed in 2021

01:13:53   that I just felt like I was just,

01:13:56   I had way too much stuff going on

01:13:58   and I don't want to have as much stuff going on.

01:14:01   I was talking to Steven about this recently,

01:14:06   I'm sure he won't mind me saying,

01:14:08   'cause he's cut down on some stuff too,

01:14:10   going into the year.

01:14:11   And one of the things that we were talking about,

01:14:14   and I think I was kind of coming to the realization

01:14:18   as we was talking about it,

01:14:19   and it was something that his wife had said to him,

01:14:20   of like, the two of us, we're kind of working still

01:14:25   like we're trying to get our business off the ground.

01:14:30   - Right.

01:14:32   - Like, we're very much still like,

01:14:34   we're trying to be, like we're scrappy,

01:14:36   and it's like, but we're not,

01:14:37   we have a very established, well-running business

01:14:40   at this point, and maybe that the two of us

01:14:44   do not need to be running ourselves into the ground

01:14:47   as much as we do when we have a pretty well-oiled machine.

01:14:52   And it was just like a really interesting thing

01:14:55   that I've been thinking about a lot.

01:14:56   - So all of us, you know, you and me and Steven,

01:15:01   and some other people we know,

01:15:03   it's been seven or eight-ish years

01:15:05   that we've been out on our own.

01:15:08   - Yep.

01:15:09   - And that initial phase is very much,

01:15:11   how do I establish myself?

01:15:14   How do I build things that I can do

01:15:17   to have it be my career?

01:15:18   How do I make it happen?

01:15:21   It's this building phase.

01:15:22   And it's also a scrambling phase, right?

01:15:24   'Cause it's like, I gotta put food on the table.

01:15:26   I gotta, you know, I'm gonna have to not go out

01:15:29   on my own anymore.

01:15:30   I'm gonna have to leave and go back

01:15:32   to what I was doing before if I can't make this work.

01:15:35   So you end up in that phase.

01:15:36   And then, you know, but the thing is,

01:15:38   you leave that phase at some point.

01:15:40   You need to leave that phase, I should say,

01:15:42   and stop thinking about it in those terms

01:15:44   and evaluate it in a different way

01:15:46   because the danger is that you build yourself a new prison.

01:15:50   The danger is you escape the old prison.

01:15:53   There's a cartoon I have from web comic name, Alex Norris,

01:15:57   and it's about a freelancer and it's like, I am free.

01:16:01   And then they build a new prison for themselves.

01:16:04   Oh no, right?

01:16:05   But there's so much truth in that.

01:16:07   Like you need to not build your own prison.

01:16:11   The goal is to be able to continue to adjust and adapt.

01:16:15   And the last thing you wanna do is be free

01:16:18   and build your own business and then burnout

01:16:20   on the business you built.

01:16:21   The last thing you wanna do.

01:16:23   And I've obviously been thinking about this too.

01:16:25   I have tried, and I talked about this back

01:16:28   when I was doing free agents with David Sparks,

01:16:30   about the importance of saying no,

01:16:33   'cause I also dropped a bunch of stuff for the new year.

01:16:36   And it's very much, that's sort of, I don't have a theme,

01:16:39   but that's sort of what I've been trying to do.

01:16:41   It's very much like you can't do anything new

01:16:45   if you're always continuing to do everything

01:16:48   you've been doing up to this point.

01:16:49   You have to say no and close some stuff down.

01:16:52   Otherwise you will never be open to new possibilities.

01:16:55   - Your theme is called the year of opportunity, Jason.

01:16:58   - Okay, thanks, great.

01:17:01   The idea, I don't think that's how I would brand it,

01:17:04   but I'm, maybe, we'll workshop it.

01:17:08   But the idea there is you need to be,

01:17:11   it's opportunity cost, right?

01:17:13   Like you're not, it's not just the work you put in on X,

01:17:17   it's also that if you're doing X,

01:17:18   you can't do whatever might come along and be a new thing.

01:17:22   And I think we also tend all of us to overwork ourselves

01:17:28   because it's hard to keep a balance when you're,

01:17:32   first off, you're doing something that you like,

01:17:34   which is great, but you're also,

01:17:36   you are working all the time.

01:17:39   And especially if you're working,

01:17:40   at least you have an office to go to,

01:17:42   but like Steven and I are working on the premises

01:17:45   and it's a challenge.

01:17:46   So reevaluating, taking a moment to reevaluate

01:17:50   what you're doing.

01:17:52   New Year is totally arbitrary.

01:17:54   It is just the earth passing through a particular part

01:17:57   of its orbit around the sun.

01:17:58   It could be any time, but I think it has some advantages.

01:18:03   Not only just it is a reset time, but also for us,

01:18:07   it comes not only after the holidays,

01:18:08   like it does for everybody, but it comes after that

01:18:10   kind of the peak of the Apple year in the fall,

01:18:14   it's not a bad time.

01:18:15   This is when we've got some runway to do stuff

01:18:18   before the kind of wild Apple stuff that starts in June

01:18:22   and really goes through November.

01:18:24   So now is a good time to do it.

01:18:26   And so, you know, I actually in December had a similar thing

01:18:30   where I realized I needed to do,

01:18:32   I used to, when I worked at IDG, I used to do these things.

01:18:35   I'd go over to somebody's house, one of my editors,

01:18:40   one of my managers lived in, still does, in Berkeley.

01:18:43   And I would take a couple of senior managers

01:18:45   and we'd go to his house and like sit

01:18:48   at his dining room table for the day and get, you know,

01:18:50   and talk about like,

01:18:51   it's just good to get out of your head space

01:18:53   and go somewhere and sort of think about

01:18:54   what you're wanting to do.

01:18:55   And I realized in December that I hadn't done that.

01:18:59   And that I actually, I wanted to do that.

01:19:01   And in my house is where I work.

01:19:03   So I can't get out of my own head space in my house.

01:19:08   So I had that moment where I'm actually gonna go

01:19:10   away, it's not quite a graycation, which is what CGP --

01:19:15   well, it is kind of a graycation,

01:19:16   but we're just driving, like, an hour away,

01:19:19   where our friends have a rental house, and there's nobody --

01:19:22   -Doesn't matter where it is. -Yeah.

01:19:24   -The idea of the graycation being, you go somewhere else.

01:19:28   -And since our friends have a rental house,

01:19:29   and nobody is using their rental house

01:19:31   in the week after New Year's, right?

01:19:34   Like, nobody is -- So they're like,

01:19:35   "Yeah, yeah, yeah, you can go there."

01:19:36   So I'm going to go there for, like, three days,

01:19:39   starting this evening, actually.

01:19:41   And I'm gonna have a couple of days

01:19:42   where I am just focused on that,

01:19:45   that sort of thinking big picture stuff.

01:19:46   Because I do think that's important.

01:19:48   And I think one of the challenges of working for yourself

01:19:49   and working from home is that you're in your own head.

01:19:52   You're no longer, it's harder.

01:19:54   You have to work at it more to kind of step out

01:19:57   of the day-to-day and think about what you're doing.

01:20:00   And it's so important to be able to step out of it

01:20:03   if you can manage it, to step out of that context

01:20:07   and not have the day-to-day going on

01:20:09   and try to think bigger picture thoughts

01:20:12   and focus on stuff that you don't give yourself permission

01:20:16   to focus on most of the time.

01:20:18   - This is like something, as you say,

01:20:20   I'm trying to build some of this in more generally

01:20:23   into my life, right?

01:20:24   Like to have that unstructured time.

01:20:26   'Cause it's very valuable.

01:20:28   And it's like to go back to something I was saying

01:20:30   a minute ago, I think one of the reasons

01:20:33   that I've really noticed and been feeling this feeling

01:20:35   of like the kind of like starting out mentality

01:20:40   is that me and Grey started a business together.

01:20:44   And we're working on various products currently

01:20:47   for the theme stuff.

01:20:50   We have a thing called the Theme System Journal.

01:20:51   It's a journal that's built around this idea.

01:20:53   And that's the thing.

01:20:54   And we're working on multiple various product things.

01:20:59   And that's like very much in that,

01:21:02   I can't think of a different word,

01:21:03   so I'm just gonna say it,

01:21:04   that hustling phase of like we're trying to make it happen.

01:21:08   - Right.

01:21:09   - And that takes a lot of energy and effort.

01:21:11   And so it's now having brought a new one of those in,

01:21:15   I'm starting to realize how much I'm still doing that

01:21:18   in my very established business.

01:21:21   - Yeah.

01:21:22   - And so, you know, balancing those two things together

01:21:25   over the last year or so is really making me realize

01:21:28   that to be most effective to both, I need better structure.

01:21:33   One of those things was like,

01:21:35   one of the ways I tried to do with this was,

01:21:38   I'll take no time off, terrible idea.

01:21:41   And was really, really bad on me towards the end of the year

01:21:44   and I've remembered the value of it,

01:21:47   kind of taking my really long vacation

01:21:49   and then taking a bit of time over the holidays

01:21:52   and I'm feeling way better now.

01:21:54   - Yeah, that's another thing about the New Year's thing

01:21:59   is it is a pretty good time.

01:22:01   I always feel pretty refreshed at New Year's

01:22:04   because I've come off of a few weeks

01:22:05   that are low to no effort.

01:22:09   And that means it's a vacation essentially.

01:22:11   Like it wasn't a vacation per se, we didn't go anywhere.

01:22:15   But you know, I, my mom came and visited,

01:22:18   I cleared off my schedule

01:22:19   so I could spend more time with her.

01:22:21   I ended up, you know, we prerecorded some stuff.

01:22:23   So the amount of stuff I had to do

01:22:25   was just so much less than it usually is.

01:22:26   That's a really good opportunity

01:22:28   because your batteries are a little more refreshed.

01:22:31   and then you had your vacation on top of that.

01:22:34   And I think that's all,

01:22:35   that primes this to be a pretty good time.

01:22:38   It doesn't have to be,

01:22:40   it's not the best time for everybody,

01:22:41   but you're looking for a proxy.

01:22:43   You're looking for something to hang your hat on about this.

01:22:48   And if I was in a different business

01:22:52   with a different kind of calendar,

01:22:53   I might look at it differently,

01:22:54   but January is not a bad proxy.

01:22:56   'Cause it really is, I feel like,

01:22:59   the Apple year heats up in June,

01:23:03   and then September and October and part of November

01:23:05   are the peak of it.

01:23:07   And then December is sort of a cooling off period

01:23:09   (laughs)

01:23:11   kind of retreating and healing.

01:23:13   And then January is like, okay, what are the new things?

01:23:15   It's a perfect kind of fit.

01:23:16   I wanna mention, you mentioned Steven doing fewer things.

01:23:22   Some of that impacts me,

01:23:23   but it's always a good time to reevaluate stuff.

01:23:28   And so I'll just mention the things that I'm doing

01:23:30   to try and take care of myself,

01:23:32   not only to open myself up to new things,

01:23:34   but also things that I felt like I needed to do

01:23:38   that I've decided I don't need to do anymore

01:23:40   because it's a, I don't need to do this

01:23:43   and I can hand it to somebody else.

01:23:45   And it gives me either one of two things,

01:23:48   which is either more opportunities

01:23:49   to do something different or more time to use in a way

01:23:55   that is healthy for me instead of it being more work.

01:23:59   So it's either taking work off the pile

01:24:02   or it's opening a space on the pile

01:24:04   for a different kind of work.

01:24:05   Those are the sort of two things.

01:24:06   So Steven and I stopped doing lift off regularly.

01:24:11   That was a decision that we made in December.

01:24:14   We're gonna do, we're not killing it.

01:24:16   We're gonna do specials when we,

01:24:18   when the mood strikes essentially,

01:24:22   which for us is, you know, we love space stuff,

01:24:25   but the fact is it's not our primary job.

01:24:27   There are a whole other podcasts where people,

01:24:30   in fact, a podcast that's very nice,

01:24:34   just Anthony Colangelo, who's the host of that podcast,

01:24:37   Mikko, he quit his job

01:24:41   and he's gonna do space stuff full-time.

01:24:43   And it's like, well, first off, that's great,

01:24:45   but also like Steven and I

01:24:47   are not gonna do space stuff full-time.

01:24:49   And it was a little podcast.

01:24:51   It's not a big portion of what we do,

01:24:53   but it was a grind of doing Space News several hours

01:24:58   every other week, and we just decided to stop.

01:25:01   And we're gonna keep doing the part that is really fun,

01:25:04   but we're gonna stop doing the other part,

01:25:05   because one, I don't think that we are ever going to be

01:25:08   the preeminent space podcast,

01:25:09   'cause we're not gonna devote that much time to it.

01:25:11   Like, we can't justify devoting that much time to it.

01:25:15   It's not our primary job.

01:25:16   It's never really gonna be.

01:25:17   We don't really want it to be our primary job.

01:25:19   So it makes sense to have it be this thing

01:25:22   that maybe we can still do for fun,

01:25:24   but neither of us, both of us had a conversation

01:25:28   where we were sort of like,

01:25:29   liftoff's kind of at the bottom of the list.

01:25:31   And I said, I think I said to Steven,

01:25:32   Steven, the real reason I do liftoff

01:25:34   is that I like talking about space with you

01:25:36   every other week.

01:25:37   And he said, same.

01:25:38   And then two weeks later, he came back to me and he said,

01:25:40   let's not do liftoff anymore.

01:25:42   So, which I think is the right call.

01:25:46   And it's sad because people liked it,

01:25:48   but it doesn't really fit for so many reasons

01:25:51   what we want to do. And I had that moment where you decide to do it and I'm like, oh my god,

01:25:55   that burden has just lifted. It's just because it was a grind and it was less fun because it was a

01:26:05   grind. So I'm happy to be done with it. And then the other big one is the incomparable where I

01:26:10   am two things there. I hired basically an editor to edit both the incomparable and downstream,

01:26:17   the new podcast that I started, somebody else is going to edit those. I take so much pride in being

01:26:23   a podcast editor, but I don't need to edit those. I take pride in it. I take pride in having

01:26:32   editorial oversight and being like, "I can fix this thing and I can fix this thing."

01:26:37   I need to not. I need to not do that. I need to just hand that off. That's something other people

01:26:41   people can do just fine, and I don't need to be involved.

01:26:45   And then in terms of hosting the Incomparable,

01:26:47   I got to the point, and I talk about this in great detail

01:26:50   on our year-end episode, I have exhausted,

01:26:54   'cause if you think about it,

01:26:56   I've been doing that podcast for 11 years, it's weekly.

01:26:59   Every episode has me on it, essentially,

01:27:04   almost 600 episodes.

01:27:05   And that means I have to come,

01:27:09   having read a book or books, seen a movie or movies,

01:27:12   watched a whole season or seasons of a TV show,

01:27:15   read a whole graphic novel, whatever it is,

01:27:18   I have to have done the homework

01:27:20   and nobody else has to do the homework every week

01:27:23   'cause it's a rotating panel.

01:27:24   And I cheated by using stuff that I'd like already read

01:27:28   or already seen for a long time.

01:27:30   But a few years ago I ran out of ways to cheat.

01:27:34   So it was really a grind.

01:27:37   The homework was a grind.

01:27:39   having to have a new thing that I had to watch or read

01:27:41   or whatever every week.

01:27:43   And then I would have to schedule a panel

01:27:46   and host an episode and then edit the episode myself.

01:27:50   And so I got an editor to edit it

01:27:52   and I committed to only doing an episode every other week.

01:27:57   So cutting the frequency back.

01:28:00   It will be more than that

01:28:01   because there are times of the year

01:28:02   where my desire to consume media is a massive failure.

01:28:07   is a match with the schedule, and, you know,

01:28:12   TV shows are finishing up and all that,

01:28:14   and I want to talk about them.

01:28:15   But there are going to be other weeks where I just --

01:28:17   I'm not committing to releasing an episode on the off weeks.

01:28:20   I'm hoping my panelists are going to step up

01:28:22   and fill those weeks with stuff that they're interested in.

01:28:25   And it's like, finally, they'll be able to talk about video games

01:28:27   that I'm never going to find the time to play.

01:28:30   But I have this realization that the comment from listeners

01:28:34   that made me the crankiest about the incomparable

01:28:37   was people asking us to cover things.

01:28:39   And they made me angry.

01:28:42   And I thought, well, why am I so angry about this?

01:28:44   And I was angry about it mostly because I think people

01:28:47   don't understand how much work goes into homework.

01:28:52   They'd be like, well, why don't you talk about this show?

01:28:55   It's like, oh, it's 10 episodes.

01:28:58   So I need to watch, you're basically assigning me

01:29:01   a whole TV show that I have not chosen to watch,

01:29:04   but I'm going to have to watch it for homework.

01:29:07   And I have to find other people

01:29:09   who are also willing to do the homework

01:29:12   so that we can have that conversation.

01:29:13   And it's a lot, whatever it is.

01:29:15   Read this book, watch this movie.

01:29:17   So I'm hoping that by not editing those episodes

01:29:22   and only committing to doing about half,

01:29:24   it'll be more than that, it'll probably be in the 30s,

01:29:26   that it will be a more reasonable workload for me

01:29:31   because what I don't want to have happen

01:29:33   is have it burn me out to the point

01:29:36   where I don't want to do it anymore.

01:29:37   - That would be terrible and sad.

01:29:39   - Yeah, I want to keep it going.

01:29:42   And I have so many panelists now that I'm hopeful,

01:29:46   this goes back to the thing

01:29:48   that we were saying before the show,

01:29:50   I'm hopeful that those other off-week episodes

01:29:54   will be filled.

01:29:55   I might need to tap somebody to be the scheduler of those,

01:30:00   to sort of prod everyone,

01:30:02   'cause I don't wanna do it, but somebody might,

01:30:05   we may need somebody to like prod them

01:30:07   so that there's, that those off week episodes are filled,

01:30:11   if I really wanna do that.

01:30:12   I'm still thinking about that one.

01:30:15   I'm not quite sure how it's gonna go.

01:30:17   But I mean, last year I put in some skip weeks

01:30:19   for the incomparable 'cause I just couldn't take it.

01:30:21   So there were like three or four that I was just like,

01:30:23   we're not doing an episode.

01:30:24   It wasn't even that many, it was like two.

01:30:26   I was like, we're not doing an episode this week.

01:30:28   I'm going on vacation.

01:30:29   I'm not doubling up in advance

01:30:31   in order to cover when I'm on vacation.

01:30:32   we're just gonna skip an episode.

01:30:33   And I had that moment where I thought,

01:30:34   okay, I need to make this happen regularly.

01:30:37   - You could skip way more of them, imagine that.

01:30:39   - Yeah, exactly right.

01:30:40   And the fact is, I just went through this last two weeks,

01:30:45   because we'd recorded our clip show episode in advance

01:30:50   and all of that, where I had two weeks where the weeks

01:30:53   and the weekend had no incomparable work on it.

01:30:56   And let me tell you, the incomparable comes from a time

01:30:58   when I worked in a job Monday through Friday.

01:31:01   And even though I don't do that anymore

01:31:03   and now I'm at home Monday through Friday,

01:31:05   I still always edited the incomparable on Saturday.

01:31:08   And let's just say my wife was like,

01:31:14   it's better that you don't have that thing hovering over us

01:31:19   on the weekend.

01:31:21   And it is.

01:31:22   So, it's already good.

01:31:25   - It's not just affecting you, right?

01:31:27   - Yeah.

01:31:27   No, I mean, it was every Saturday we'd be like,

01:31:29   what are we doing this weekend?

01:31:30   I'd say, "Well, I gotta edit the incomparable."

01:31:32   I was like, "I can't do that anymore."

01:31:33   It has had side effects,

01:31:35   and I know you and I have talked about this.

01:31:38   There are side effects.

01:31:39   So not editing your show and having someone else do it,

01:31:44   it does, if you're on the show,

01:31:49   you can take notes about what needs to be fixed.

01:31:51   If you're not on the show, you can't.

01:31:53   If you're handing it off to an editor,

01:31:55   what you really want to do ideally is give them a heads up.

01:31:59   here are the issues, here's what to look for,

01:32:01   here's what I want you to change, right?

01:32:04   It's not just like, good luck, whatever.

01:32:06   I want, if I took pride in editing podcasts

01:32:09   because I wanted to do what I wanted to do with them

01:32:11   to make them sound exactly like I wanted,

01:32:13   okay, maybe too perfection-y,

01:32:15   I'm not gonna get that from a different editor,

01:32:17   but what I can do is commit to taking better notes

01:32:21   and giving those notes to the editor,

01:32:23   so I can say, there's a problem here,

01:32:25   and I'd like you to do this.

01:32:27   So that is a burden that I'm willing to take on

01:32:30   that's new for me after 10 years,

01:32:33   where I relied on my own brain to do this.

01:32:36   I actually spent a day last week,

01:32:39   'cause I sent you the link to it when I was done,

01:32:42   building a thing that makes it easier for me to take notes

01:32:47   about my podcasts as I'm doing them.

01:32:50   And that work I put in because I know that I'm, right,

01:32:53   It's like I'm letting go of this big job,

01:32:57   but I am creating a new little job for myself

01:33:00   that I need to do.

01:33:00   But it unlocks all of this time.

01:33:04   So it's worth making a change to my process upfront

01:33:08   so that I can get that time back on the backside.

01:33:11   - Or the other thing that you do with an edit,

01:33:13   which I do on a couple of my shows,

01:33:16   is can I just trust them to get it right?

01:33:20   - Oh yeah, there's trust involved regardless.

01:33:23   But what I did, you know, is build this, you know, build this note-taking

01:33:30   thing that's like a note-taking script. That is me trying to find a way to

01:33:40   kind of like make it easier on me to hand it off, right? Because like I

01:33:49   I don't want to hand it off with nothing.

01:33:51   I know I need to say there's a swear there.

01:33:56   I thought about building a version of it.

01:33:58   The version I've got, there's two buttons on my stream deck and one of them just puts

01:34:01   down a time code and the other one puts down a time code with a note.

01:34:03   It asks you to type in a note and you hit return and it gets added to the page.

01:34:07   I thought about doing a version that's literally like a menu of show me in which way the panelists

01:34:13   hurt you.

01:34:14   And it's like they swore there was a bad sound in the background

01:34:18   There was an interruption

01:34:21   Like I thought about doing that and I may yet do that like just like the quick quick like which which crime was committed here

01:34:28   But that's that gives me a little bit more comfort in handing it off, right?

01:34:33   It's still not the same right as having complete control

01:34:36   But it is enough

01:34:40   for me to feel like I can hand it off without,

01:34:43   you know, it's control freaks giving up control.

01:34:45   Like it is totally that.

01:34:46   I have complete editorial control

01:34:49   and I take great pride in that

01:34:51   and I can't do that anymore.

01:34:52   So I'm trying to find a way

01:34:53   to exert a little bit of editorial discretion

01:34:56   without having the complete control over it.

01:34:59   'Cause I know I just can't do that anymore.

01:35:01   - Well, I'll say real quick, if people will permit me to,

01:35:05   if you have enjoyed this conversation,

01:35:07   this is very similar to the kinds of conversations

01:35:10   we have on Upgrade Plus. I feel like, like in its tone, throughout the year, yeah that's

01:35:14   true. We touch on these kinds of things quite a lot. We actually have a little bit more

01:35:19   of this conversation in today's Upgrade Plus. If you haven't signed up, go to getupgradeplus.com,

01:35:24   $5 a month or $50 a year, we'd really appreciate your support. You get a bunch of bonuses,

01:35:29   which is also longer ad-free episodes of the show.

01:35:33   Yeah, that's another thing that I'm doing on the incomparable, is I'm taking the Upgrade

01:35:37   plus model and I'm building and having my editor build a special edition, I'm calling

01:35:42   it of incomparable with the extra stuff and no ads and all of that too. So that's on my

01:35:47   list of things for the for this year. So overall I would say my retrospective theme that is

01:35:55   not a thing for 2021 was learning some new stuff, was trying to go outside my comfort

01:36:03   zone and learning some new stuff.

01:36:04   You did do a lot of that, didn't you?

01:36:07   Yeah, the Python thing.

01:36:08   So my son signed up for an Advanced Placement Computer Principles class that they said he'll

01:36:14   be writing in Python.

01:36:15   I thought, well, that's really exciting.

01:36:17   Maybe I should learn Python.

01:36:19   And I don't know what he's learning in it.

01:36:22   He's done a semester of it and I mentioned about string coercion.

01:36:26   And he was like, I don't know what that is.

01:36:27   I'm like, how have you not learned that yet?

01:36:29   But I have opinions about Python now because I spent a lot of time using Python, doing

01:36:34   new Mac shortcuts as well.

01:36:37   I got a Stream Deck Mini in the spring, six buttons, because I was very skeptical about

01:36:42   the Stream Deck, but I thought, "I'll try this thing."

01:36:44   And in a classic Snell fashion, where you buy the cheap one because you think you're

01:36:49   probably not going to want it.

01:36:51   And then you go, "Oh, actually I'm now convinced that this is good."

01:36:56   We did the classic, Stephen Hackett bought a Stream Deck XL.

01:37:00   I bought his Stream Deck and I sold my Stream Deck Mini to a friend who is going to take

01:37:06   it.

01:37:07   It's the circle of life.

01:37:08   And then that friend will realize that they want a regular sized Stream Deck and buy that.

01:37:12   Exactly.

01:37:13   It'll all just keep going like that.

01:37:15   It's multi-level marketing is what it is.

01:37:16   It is sort of shaped like a pyramid.

01:37:18   Anyway, I embraced that too because it fits in with a lot of my automation stuff.

01:37:24   the new Stream Deck fits kind of to the side of my keyboard.

01:37:27   It's actually really nice to have those buttons

01:37:30   that are icons.

01:37:32   My argument against the Stream Deck was always,

01:37:37   why do I need any kind of macro pad

01:37:40   if I can just do Command + Shift + Control + 9 or whatever?

01:37:43   And the answer is 'cause you never remember those things.

01:37:46   And then the one time you need it

01:37:48   that it's supposed to grease the skids

01:37:49   and make your life easier to have a keyboard shortcut,

01:37:51   It doesn't happen enough often enough

01:37:53   for it to be muscle memory.

01:37:54   So you sit there going, is it command control one?

01:37:57   Is it command shift one?

01:37:58   And it's like the moment passes

01:38:00   and you're not saving time doing automation.

01:38:03   And now it's a button that is an icon

01:38:07   that you can put on it that does the thing.

01:38:09   Like the other day I realized I would use launch bar

01:38:13   to open terminal and then SSH to my server.

01:38:16   And I thought, or I could put the SSH command on a button.

01:38:21   So when I press the button,

01:38:22   terminal opens already SSHed into my server.

01:38:25   It's like, oh yeah, okay.

01:38:28   Like all of those things.

01:38:29   So more automation, learning Python,

01:38:32   I really kind of cracked open the data files

01:38:34   on my weather station,

01:38:36   which has allowed me to upgrade my weather station,

01:38:40   which I love.

01:38:41   It's fun, but also I like having the power over that.

01:38:46   It's giving me problems that I have to learn how to do,

01:38:49   solve in Python, that is fun.

01:38:51   And also it's allowing me to improve a thing

01:38:53   that I can't improve.

01:38:55   Like the app gives me what it gives me,

01:38:57   but now I can break it apart even further than I used to be.

01:39:02   I used to use PHP to break apart some of the output

01:39:05   of the weather station and do some custom things.

01:39:08   And now I have these Python scripts that I can run

01:39:10   that do it.

01:39:11   It's very fun for me to do that.

01:39:13   And the first Python project I did was actually automating

01:39:16   the Six Colors newsletter.

01:39:17   So it was an actual work thing that I applied it to.

01:39:19   So that is in hindsight kind of the big thing for 21 for me,

01:39:24   was challenging my brain to do some new stuff

01:39:31   and think in some new ways, which are kind of old ways.

01:39:35   It definitely brought me back to back when I was a teenager

01:39:38   and learning to program in basic and stuff like that,

01:39:42   but at a whole other level.

01:39:43   And after kind of hacking around with JavaScript

01:39:47   for widgets and stuff in 2020 using Scriptable,

01:39:51   which is fine, but like JavaScript is frustrating

01:39:55   and hacking around in 2019 with PHP

01:39:59   for Six Colors WordPress themes.

01:40:02   In '21, I did Python because I wanted to,

01:40:05   and I liked it and I'm glad I did it.

01:40:07   So just trying to keep my brain plastic

01:40:09   and learning new things and applying all of that

01:40:13   to other automation stuff and shortcuts

01:40:15   and Stream Deck and all of that kind of stuff.

01:40:17   A lot of fun.

01:40:18   So that in hindsight,

01:40:20   I'm actually pretty happy with the changes that I made

01:40:23   and the things I learned in 2021.

01:40:25   That's what I was going for.

01:40:26   - All right, thank you for listening to this,

01:40:29   I think very special New Year's edition of Upgrade.

01:40:33   Ask Upgrade will be back next week.

01:40:35   If you'd like to send in a question for us

01:40:37   to answer on the show,

01:40:37   just send out a tweet with the hashtag #AskUpgrade

01:40:39   or use question mark AskUpgrade

01:40:41   in the Relay FM members Discord.

01:40:42   No, no, no, no, no, no, no, next time, next time.

01:40:45   Please, please rescind the lasers.

01:40:47   - No, the lasers, if you don't shoot the lasers off

01:40:49   every so often, they break.

01:40:51   - They just explode.

01:40:52   - So those lasers were just released into the cosmos.

01:40:54   - And then we didn't do it last time,

01:40:55   so it does make sense that you did that.

01:40:57   - Yeah. - It was probably

01:40:58   for the best. - Yeah.

01:40:59   - Thank you so much to Bombas, Fitbud, and DoorDash

01:41:03   for their support of this week's episode.

01:41:05   Thank you for listening.

01:41:06   Thank you if you are a member and support the show too.

01:41:09   We really, really appreciate that.

01:41:10   If you want to find Jason online,

01:41:12   you can go to sixcolors.com,

01:41:13   is @jasonell on Twitter, JSNEELL. I am @imike, I am Y-K-E. I would very much like it if you

01:41:21   would take a look at the Theme System Journal. Go to themesystem.com and you can find out

01:41:25   a little bit more about what that is. Some of this conversation today has been of interest

01:41:29   to you. We'll be back next time. Until then, say goodbye, Jason Snell.

01:41:35   - Goodbye, everybody.

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